Yihan Zhang

In Chinese garden space, there is a "spiritual realm" created, with various tangible objects used to build an imaginary world and shape the beauty of the void. With an external character, the Eastern garden allows people to communicate with the garden space from different perspectives. As for the garden itself, there is the introverted expression to reflect the world of an individual. Inspired by this, Yihan’s installations resemble Eastern gardens, expressing a dialogue between the outside world and the inner world.

In the external expression, Yihan expresses her understanding of traditional gardens and spaces, she translates these traditional space conceptions into contemporary art forms, which specifically use comprehensive materials and techniques, examples include using distorted mirrors to present windows from the traditional garden and the conception of “scenery will be change with people’s movement. Yihan hopes that the mirror surface will take on the role of the "viewing frame" in the garden, reflecting the surrounding environment, and guide the audience to think about the relationship with the space and the work.

In the introverted expression, the “Travel in Time” series is more personal and emotional. This series was created when Yihan came to London. Due to the physical distance, the oriental backgrounds and related memories have gradually become blurred. Inspired by the literati in the Song Dynasty, they regarded private garden space as a spiritual space to convey their perspective of the world, Yihan shaped her personal spiritual garden through her works to re-shape time, memory, and space, and construct her visual content from the writing, patterns, oriental textile techniques, and recycled hand-made paper.

Through her works, Yihan hopes to explore the relationship between installations, people, space, and culture. Despite Bringing a new perspective to tradition by using contemporary artistic language, Yihan shapes the space by atmosphere and emotion, which helps construct dialogues with the audience.