Seeing the Balsam Flowers as a Farewell to Precepts

JW PROJECTS is honoured to announce the premiere solo exhibition of  Chen Li in Singapore, “Seeing the Balsam Flowers as a Farewell to Precepts,” from April 27th to June 9th 2024. This exhibition will present Chen Li’s year-long exploration through painting and installations, focusing on contemporary narratives of femininity, cultural identity, and the aesthetics of Oriental mysticism around the theme of the balsam flower.

Common yet resilient, the balsam flower thrives in even the most barren soils and is prevalent throughout the countryside. Growing up in the rural areas of Zhejiang, Chen Li was deeply influenced by ancestral worship, local folklore, and communal rituals. These elements of rural femininity, marginalised and stigmatised in their desires and expressions, have captured Chen Li’s artistic contemplation, swaying her work between demystification and remystification of these blurred memories. The act of dyeing her nails with balsam flowers in her childhood marks the narrative genesis of her art.

In Chen Li’s works, mineral pigments bring to life the balsam flowers, depicting women’s desires and fantasies with strokes that are gentle yet decisive, colours that are sweet, and forms seductively alluring, adding an elusive touch of mysticism to the canvas. Shrines, snails, candles, and feathers serve as ritualistic installations, perfectly metaphorising the forced sanctification and self-sacrifice of the Other—as in the tale of the Snail Lady, a paragon of selfless devotion ultimately sanctified and silenced. In this sanctification, all women gradually become the nourishment for symbols.

Seeing the balsam flowers is an act of farewell to Precepts. The flowers in the artwork, with their mottled astringency—like flaws in white jade or mildew on silk—create a subtle discomfort, yet speak in more evocative tones. The canvas exudes a charm that subtly rejects strict precepts, where ambiguous desires intertwine and spread, ultimately calling for those on the altars to step down—return to the secular, to one’s true self, and to the everyday, finding tragic intoxication in the cruel yet beautiful spirit of Dionysian.

Text / Lianyi Wang