清影

Inna Art Space is pleased to announce the opening of artist Bignia Wehrli's first solo exhibition in Hangzhou, China, “A way, any way”, on May 17th at 3 pm. The exhibition runs until June 30.

Rain traces on paper form different variations; parabolic sun movements are captured like black meteors across the sky; forked branches interconnect to form thousands of paths leading in different directions; and the blue of the sky becomes a two-dimensional plane that puts an end to infinity. Points, lines and surfaces - the three abstract basic elements that make up spatial imagery - are presented in the works in this exhibition in a very concrete and material way.

Collecting, tracing, measuring and inventing -- these actions in Bignia Wehrli’s artistic practice -- are implanted in the dynamics of nature in a very subtle way. In the process of creation, she often appears as a collaborator with nature. For her artistic translations, Wehrli often invents new techniques and instruments that act as an extension of the artist’s hand.

The observation and translation of spatial movement and traces have always been a major concern in Wehrli’s work. Traces are the proof of the “crime” that time has committed against space. They provide the visual information with which people can read and feel time. Wehrli's experiments on how to capture traces are in fact an invention of different ways of perceiving time. The following descriptions of traditional brushwork methods in Chinese calligraphy, such as “like drawing lines in the sand with an awl, like stamping the clay with a stamp, like stains under the eaves,” echo in Wehrli’s work. She translates and transforms the relationships and interconnections between people, objects and events into enigmatic yet legible drawings.

Inna Art Space is pleased to announce the opening of artist Bignia Wehrli's first solo exhibition in Hangzhou, China, “A way, any way”, on May 17th at 3 pm. The exhibition runs until June 30.

Rain traces on paper form different variations; parabolic sun movements are captured like black meteors across the sky; forked branches interconnect to form thousands of paths leading in different directions; and the blue of the sky becomes a two-dimensional plane that puts an end to infinity. Points, lines and surfaces - the three abstract basic elements that make up spatial imagery - are presented in the works in this exhibition in a very concrete and material way.

Collecting, tracing, measuring and inventing -- these actions in Bignia Wehrli’s artistic practice -- are implanted in the dynamics of nature in a very subtle way. In the process of creation, she often appears as a collaborator with nature. For her artistic translations, Wehrli often invents new techniques and instruments that act as an extension of the artist’s hand.

The observation and translation of spatial movement and traces have always been a major concern in Wehrli’s work. Traces are the proof of the “crime” that time has committed against space. They provide the visual information with which people can read and feel time. Wehrli's experiments on how to capture traces are in fact an invention of different ways of perceiving time. The following descriptions of traditional brushwork methods in Chinese calligraphy, such as “like drawing lines in the sand with an awl, like stamping the clay with a stamp, like stains under the eaves,” echo in Wehrli’s work. She translates and transforms the relationships and interconnections between people, objects and events into enigmatic yet legible drawings.

In “Rain Variations”, Wehrli uses paper coated with cyanotype to collect rainfall from different places, and then exposes these traces to the sunlight to fix the images. These captured rain structures are between “image” and “impression”, creations made with the participation of sunshine and rain. In “A Thousand Suns”, in order to solidify the image of several thousand suns on a single sheet of photographic paper, she constructed a black box of 200 cm in length and 108 cm in width, in which she placed a light-sensitive paper of the corresponding size. The box lid is covered with 100 pinholes darkened with high-intensity filters, which allow only the image of the sun to pass through and create an impression on the paper during a short exposure. When the box is in a fixed position, the paper records the relative movement of the sun's arc in the sky by exposing it at specific time intervals. By rotating the box and making rhythmic exposures, the trace of the sun's movement recorded by each pinhole shows the image of an overlapping double spiral. The super position of one hundred double spiral images on a single sheet of photographic paper presents a state where chaos and order coexist. In the process of creation, many random factors and chances bring about new coincidences: they are like branching paths that lead into unknown territories.

These branching paths are very well visualised in Wehrli’s work “Bifurcations”: The branches that split in two in search of sunlight become a fork in the road in the picture. Imagine a traveler standing at a fork in the road: we don't know where the traveler comes from, let alone where the traveler is going. A way could be any way. Away, anyway.