Yanni Zhong and Ruotong (Olivia) Wu: Growing Pain

Abstract

Growing Pain consists of two parts: growth and time, which bring together the works of Ruotong (Olivia) Wu (B.F.A. ’27), while “pains” represents Yanni Zhong (B.F.A. ’27). They are closely intertwined, forming life experiences that anyone may have gone through at certain stages of life.

Yanni’s “pains” approach the body and society through a sensitive and critical lens. Her works examine the pain imposed on bodies, individuals, and collective spaces through research into the Three Gorges Dam, the Dashilar redevelopment, and the contemporary persistence of foot-binding-like pressures. These forms of pain emerge in different moments and through different structures: sometimes through the body, sometimes through the mind, and sometimes through the spaces we inhabit together.

The “growing” part by Ruotong is a story for all mothers and children. It traces the cycles within relationships, and the subtle process of breaking those cycles. It attends to the nuances of life, its poignancy, its quiet emotional weight. The piece translates narrative into feeling, and feeling into visual language.

Ultimately, Ruotong and Yanni seek a space for emotional autonomy and feeling, for themselves, and for the viewer.