MANGROVEGALLERY 红树林画廊

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Fang KaiFirefly
2023.10.28-12.16
MANGROVEGALLERY, Shenzhen

MANGROVEGALLERY is honoured to present Fang Kai’s solo exhibition Firefly, featuring the latest paintings by the artist. In these paintings, personal experiences and dormant emotions hidden in memories are recreated and represented on the canvas, through delicate shimmers in twilit sanctuaries or untamed woodlands.

Fireflies glow in nature. Few would ask questions and dig into why or how they glow. Once we come across them at night, we hold our breaths, contemplating them, until they disappear into the shadows. Almost always, the firefly seems to materialize all of a sudden out of darkness, and its light is never more than just a glimmer. One can still come upon fireflies in the Dabie Mountains, Fang’s hometown. They seem to be specks of green starlight, fluttering in the darkness of night, which, once we chance to gaze upon them, fill us with serenity. The glow in Fang’s works, created while he is away from the buzz of the busy city, is just like this – quiet, reserved, unassuming, tacit. Painting is how Fang shines; his works, completed while he retreats into a private world, glow like fireflies. Through painting, sentiments, no matter how obscure, take shape; worlds, no matter how distant, draw nearer. A relaxed sense of distance coexists with a sense of close connectedness in his works. The inner world away from the clamour of crowded streets is given over to the canvas; as we look at it, it glows like the faint glimmer of stars.