ENNOVA Art Museum Young Curators Program First-Stage Finalists Announcement

Since the "Young Curators" program officially began soliciting curatorial proposals in May 2024, the art museum has received over 60 submissions from young curators worldwide until the submission deadline. After preliminary screening, 29 exhibition proposals will participate in the expert review process, and the final award-winning and presentable proposals will also be generated from them. Through these programs, we can see the young curators' grasp of the themes and trends of contemporary art development, as well as their awareness and in-depth thinking on many hot topics in today's society. We will give a brief introduction to 29 curatorial schemes participating in the selection in two chapters. 

With the support and assistance of the curators, we have jointly organized their curatorial proposals, which span one hundred thousands of words. This public account will introduce the 29 curatorial proposals participating in the selection in two parts, hoping to showcase the efforts and thoughts of each young curator. This issue will feature a brief introduction to the proposals of the curators ranked 1-15, and more follow-up developments and related content are to be anticipated!

introduction is arranged in order of submission time and does not represent the final ranking.

01

Nine-to-Five Theater: How to Work Better

Curator: Zhang Jiawei

The exhibition Nine-to-Five Theater: How to Work Better focuses on the relationship between people and labor/work in modern society, attempting to explore the work motivations and modes of different industries since the 1980s through media such as photography, imaging, and games. The design of the exhibition revolves around the form of a "theater"，during the exhibition, the audience will receive instructions from the artists to complete real tasks or fictional performances and finally join the play.

02

Borrowing the Silver

LampCurator: Li Jiawen

This exhibition borrows its name from Eileen Chang's essay Borrowing the Silver Lamp, aiming to light a lamp that focuses on Chinese local culture, thought, values, and knowledge systems, thereby re-examining the richness and complexity of indigenous cultures.

03

New Orders of Distance

Curator: Zhang Siyang

Based on the observation of the current social environment, the exhibition New Orders of Distance introduces Edward T. Hall's theory of proxemics into the realm of contemporary art for critical reflection. It focuses on the contemporary social environment and attempts to explore the complexity of spatial relationships, such as life after the epidemic, the development of artificial intelligence and Sociopolitical changes. The exhibition is structured into two parts: the works in “Prohibition andStasis” feature unchangeable physical distances between people, while the works in “Laxity And Flux” involve negotiable distances.

04

Night Voyage on a Foggy Sea

Curator: Yin Shuai

The exhibition draws inspiration from director Shi Hui's film of the same name created in the 1950s. "Foggy Sea" symbolizes the current global social environment filled with extreme uncertainty. Night Voyage on a Foggy Sea addresses the unease, urgency, and responses to both present realities and the future. The exhibition plan presents the conflicts hidden in internal reality and systemic reality that artists reveals through theirs creations in different cultural and social contexts around the world.

05

SPACE

Curator: Tang Xiaoqing, Fernanda I. Gonzalez, Wang Wenting

Combining the concept of "space" from traditional culture with the contemporary cognitive science theory of "psychological space," this curation plan, expressed through postmodernist thought, offers a new perspective. It aims to help people in the fast-paced rhythm of life find an immediate self-space during the exhibition, fostering a connection with the artwork and allowing the seeds of long-term self-reflection space to germinate.

06

W. Anthropomorphic Warehouse - Decoding Consumer Society

Curator: WHY pedestrian

（Wu Jiajie, Huang Yunzhu, Yu Wenxi）

The exhibition “W. Anthropomorphic Warehouse - Decoding Consumer Society” focuses on the issue of false satisfaction in consumer society, attempting to construct a multidimensional mirror of modern society and recreate the landscape of consumer society. Through two sections named "NO.1 Physical Economy" and "NO.2 Perceptual Disenchantment", the exhibition will guide audiences to re-examine their consumption behavior and values from both physical and mental perspectives, and reflect on their dual identities as consumers and consumer goods.

07

Fields under the artificial sun

Curator: Xiang Qi, Wang Yawei

The father of the tokamak, Lev Artsimovich, once said, "Fusion will be realized when the whole society needs it. " The artists of “The Field Under the Artificial Sun” , as mirrors of society, follow the same path as scientists: from exploration, research, and production to delivery and sharing with the public. Countless scientists are now working on "making the sun" (controlled nuclear fusion), which will completely solve the ultimate energy problem. With their unique artistic language and innovative perspectives, the artists imagine the future of resource utilization and invite everyone to become a co-author of the Earth's future narrative.

08

Learning to labor: Collective Art Practices in the Factory

Curator: Lyu Dongkun, Chen Lingli

The exhibition originates from the curators' ongoing contemplation on how to conduct collective art practice, inspired by the production cooperation of workshop workers. The exhibition is divided into three sections in the form of "workshops": "Body as a Medium", "Production of Material Value" and "Global Diaspora and World Factory", exploring the various values and characteristics of workers' labor practices in different contexts through a series of art works.

09

Return to the lands

Curator: lulumean studio

（Zhang Luming, Liao Yingyi, He Wanglin）

The exhibition is inspired by Tao Yuanming's work Return to the Fields .Curators selected art works from artists with cross-regional and cross-cultural learning and creative backgrounds, attempts to show how they uses their own original artistic characteristics to collide and communicate with the new cultural environment, thereby realizing the exploration of self-identity.

10

What Year Might It Be Tonight

Curator: Rainne Zeng, Qiutong Zhang

Originating from the "Chinese Renaissance" a century ago, “What Year Might It Be Tonight” highlights young artists acting as "landscape architects" and "scenery creators," emphasizing their cross-cultural references to history. The exhibition progresses from "Contemporary," which employs the adaptation and transformation of cultural traditions, to "Avant-garde," which explores the accumulation of technological media in a society of spectacle, and finally to "Post-contemporary," reflecting on decentralization with a future-oriented perspective. It aims to explore the independent identity of Chinese contemporary art and the uniqueness of Chinese cultural traditions.

11

Heat After Silence : The Demon Star And The Helmsman

Curator: Gao Yiwei, Xu Chumeng

“Heat After Silence : The Demon Star And The Helmsman” will be positioned as a digital art exhibition, The narrative of this exhibition revolves around the energy flow of the fictional planet Maxwell's Demon Star, shaping an equally ideal system, that is, an anti-entropy planet, to discuss the order of different dimensions and the relationship between information and the regular distribution within systems.

12

Becoming Grotesque

Curator: Li Hanwei, Miao Zijin

The group exhibition “Becoming Grotesque” brings together Asian artists born in the 1980s and 1990s, aiming to reconceptualize the interplay between man and machine by exploring the interactions among humans, animals, plants, inanimate objects, energy, technology, and ecology. With the accelerated development of local culture and socio-political realities, the concept of the "Grotesque" emerges as a ghostly and unknown phenomenon, which becomes a quantifiable and traceable medium.

13

From Market to Art Encryption System

Curator: Dabaihua Curating Group

(Zhang Mengting, Dong Jiaojiao)

The curator believes that contemporary art and its theories often make it difficult for audiences to understand. Therefore, they have categorized artworks based on their characteristics into exhibition sections like "Fruit Section," "Meat Section," and "Deli Section," using the familiar and approachable setting of a marketplace. This integration aims to create a direct communication environment between the exhibition and the audience, allowing visitors to find a familiar life atmosphere within the exhibition.

14

Charging Guide

Curator: Zheng Zhuyun, Zhang Qianyuan

Weak-tie interpersonal relationships, characterized by "dazi culture" (buddy culture）, "lonely economy" and etc., has become a trend of contemporary social life among the Chinese younger generations. Factors such as urbanization, digitalization, the attention economy, individualism, "nei juan" (involution) and personality-based social choices have all contributed to the atomization of social relationships and intensified the sense of alienation between individuals. The exhibition “Charging Guide” aims to re-examine the boundaries between the individual and the collective through contemporary art, and to explore possible alternative social modes under new technological context. It also hopes to build an accessible "charging station" for those who need it in the fast-paced urban routine and intense social life.

15

The Ministry of Pain

Curator: Zhang Zongxi

The exhibition “The Ministry of Pain” is inspired by the novel of the same name by Dubravka Ugrešić, a Dutch writer of former Yugoslav descent. The exhibition focuses on artworks related to physical and mental "pain". It will be divided into three sections exploring issues related to "intergenerational", "Inside and Outside the Body ", "‘Others’ or ‘Hometown’", showcasing artistic responses to trauma and pain.

16

Heterogeneous Dispersion: Frequency waiting to be decoded

Curator: Ma Qiuzi, Zhang Yi

The exhibition derives from contemporary theories of medium materiality in the "material turn", focusing on electromagnetic waves as a medium and reinterpreting the meaning of Benjamin Bratton's "The Stack" -Earth is developing a planetary-scale computing technology architecture: a vertical space of sensors, satellites, cables, communication protocols and software, filled with escaping charged particles, messages to be decoded, protocols between ports, and radioactive dust...And these invisible frequencies are like a transparent mist, suspending around the material world, depositing the organic and inorganic, the natural and non-human politics. 

The exhibition uses radio waves to link up six cyclic narrative structures, attempting to draw attention to those escaping narratives outside the technical range through a series of data energies surrounding the technological medium and masked between the magnetic fields of the vertical electric field.

17

Michelle Fung: Glory! Thou art 2084!

Curator: Gu Xuewei

The solo exhibition curated for the interdisciplinary artist Michelle Fung presents the decade-long project Polluta of the artist from HongKong. The exhibition connects the imagined eco-utopian world of 2084 through five audio pieces, including songs of Polluta and the artist's voice.

18

Hold on Hold

Curator: Chen Zihan, Wang Jiayi

The exhibition title “Hold on Hold” is derived from Daisuke Kosugi’s 2019 work, where the body practices and twists repeatedly in a standardized space supported by man-made objects, hinting at the arduous attempts to maintain physical and mental balance in modern life. The exhibition invites the audience to engage in participatory practices (ready-to-hand), creating connections with objects. Through repeatedly interactive acts(to grasp and maintain) between the body and objects, the exhibition seeks to transcend the boundaries between individuals and objects, reconstructing our perception of the objects.

19

As Above, So Below

Curator: Han Jiatong, Liu Zeqian, Xie Qingyang

The exhibition aims to explore the relationship between human evolution, upright walking, and modern civilization. Through a spiraling upward circulation, the exhibition ostensibly simulates humanity's trajectory. The artworks draw inspiration from the ocean, land, and cosmos to reflect on and imagine alternative possibilities for post-human survival thinking: returning to a non-functional horizontal state. From "drifting homeward" to the ocean of human origins, to "return to the cave" in the interiority of life, and even "lost in nowhere" searching for the self, art dissolves utilitarian purposes, restoring the body to a horizontal state and triggering introspection at the level of thought. In this process of returning, we dwell on roaming, echoing in sync with nature, here and there.

20

My Frontier: The Nascent Garden

Curator: Han Hao

The exhibition is about the creations of members in the SIDE PROJECT. It focuses on human survival difficulties and warnings against disasters, forming a resonant work group with philosophical and historically responsive works. The curator believes that it is a natural concern about the issue of common human survival for a generation that has grown up in the context of informatization. The exhibition also reflects a parallel living situation of young people today.

21

In Equivalence: The Boundless Dance of I and We

Curator: Li Junru

The exhibition is divided into three sections: ‘Imperfection and Wholeness,’ ‘Original and Transformation,’ and ‘Unknown and Illusion.’ These sections intertwine the internal concepts of body, time, and space. The artworks, expressed through various mediums, including painting, video, sculpture, and installation, create an immersive experimental space. This space connects people, objects, and scenarios, inviting them to observe the evolving relationship between ‘I’ and ‘We.’

22

To mend the vanished shore with diffused moonlight

Curator: He Fei, Zhang Yuan

Designer: Wu Shuwei

This exhibition is inspired by Borges' literary work The Garden of Forking Paths, which attempts to explore the tension between reality and potential possibilities through contemporary art narrative, and how this tension shapes our understanding of the world and individual self-awareness. Through the exhibition, we hope to provoke the audience to question and reflect on the diversity of existence and the non-linearity of time. By engaging with traditional epistemological discourse, we aim to trigger thoughts on contemporary critical philosophy, explore possible forms of self-existence, and examine and reconstruct the individual's position and significance.

23

Inside and Outside the House  The Art of Everyday Objects

Curator: Pan Yitian, Ma Danyi, Xiang Jiahui

The exhibition focuses on the contemporary art phenomena of everyday objects being turned into art. Curators selected relevant works of contemporary Chinese young artists, classifying and displaying them according to the way they deal with daily objects. The exhibition attempts to explore material's physical and spiritual aspect, as well as the individual and social concerns, and conduct in-depth research on aesthetic sensibility, and guide the audience to perceive contemporary art and appreciate the beauty of daily life.

24

Upon the Field of Narrative

Collection: Material Evidence for the Oral Epic

Curator: ART CONTAINER (Wang Nan, Zheng Haowen)

The exhibition space is transformed into a field of scattered wilderness, focuses on the eventful turn in the works, showcasing the scene after its occurrence through material evidence and archives. It also invites visitors into a realm of exploration or pilgrimage, to collect poetry and observe the local customs, also probe the path ahead. These creative research projects which born from specific times and places, persist in participant observation with a stance of hyper-locality amid trends of cultural assimilation. It collects the "Feng"(Folk Songs) of regions, giving current affair "Feng"(Satire). This exhibition starts from the common collection with the audience, re-initiates the narrative of events through retrospective actions within the exhibition space, and builds a discourse space and archival context with consciousness of problems, in which the collection undergo multiple polyphony, and the narrative poem moves towards a more penetrable and contemplative aria.

25

Tamtamzhuan (Rotating in a hollow): When Nursery Rhymes Become Local Metaphors

Tuantuanzhuan Group (Jin Wen, Li Wenhui, Hong Huimin)

The exhibition uses rich visual languages to preface Cantonese nursery rhymes, recreating the diverse connections between the "society" and the "individual" presented in these rhymes. When dialectal nursery rhymes become representative metaphors of a place, it signifies breaking away from the traditional macro-narrative frameworks and employing "micro-narratives" to depict current scenes and embodied experiences. This approach will guide the associations and reflections on the relationship between the individual and the place.

26

Memory as the "Core": "Nostalgic Technology" and "Technological Nostalgia" of the Millennial Generation

Curator: Zhang Yehong, Lin Luqi, Gao Yu

The exhibition focuses on the nostalgia prevalent among the current "millennial generation" and the cultural phenomena derived from it. The exhibition constructs itself as a time machine, displaying art works related to nostalgic themes such as "liminal space", "Y2K", and "dream core". Utilizing space as a medium, memory as a core, and emotion as a chain, it intertwines and layers these elements, presenting the cultural symptoms under these nostalgic aesthetics, and the "retrospective" salvation of a voiceless future and utopia.

27

The Second Incursion into Lethargy

Curator: Liu Fangfei，Sun Liao

Burnout is the invention of this age. Since the fatigue-free utopias of the last century, the fantasy of labour incarnated as efficient machines continues to evolve. Today, users allured by the digital capital indulge in making excessive and successive decisions until they completely forget themselves in the stream of data.

"The Second Incursion into Lethargy" looks at this evasion in a wider social context and how it has become a double abandonment in the sense of morality and responsibility. The exhibition will present a tug-of-war between two physical limits and take lethargy as a currency. Ten artists are invited to respond with “Disordered Attention, “Limited Lethargy” and “Always loading” in an attempt to reveal the lie of choosing power in the digital age. When you are lethargic, can you awake from the digital world? 

28

Ripples on Ruins-Nature, Computation, and Sensory Experience

Curator: Tian Yi, Zhang Jingling, Zhang Yang

The exhibition delves into the complex relationship between nature, technology and human sensory experience in contemporary society. In this era driven by technology and capital efficiency, people are increasingly experiencing nature through digital media such as short videos, video games, and travel advertisements, reflecting the reality of the increasing alienation between the two. The exhibition uses the shape of "ripples" as the spatial layout of the exhibition, and uses this metaphor to explore the intrusion of digital media into our real lives.

29

CountryParks and Street Trees

Curator: Ofelia Cui

In modern urban life, the rapid urbanization process has made the relationship between the natural ecosystem and the human living environment increasingly tense. However, country parks and street trees, as two important forms of urban green space, play a key role in alleviating urban pressure and improving residents' quality of life. With the theme of “Country Parks and Street Trees” , this exhibition will gradually excavate and explore together with the discussion of man and nature, the confrontation between individuals and groups, environmental design, natural ecology, psychology and other research.