128. FELIX GONZALEZ TORRES: A SPACE BETWEEN SWEETNESS AND LIFE.

MINIMAL, Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection - PARIS.

Felix Gonzalez Torres, Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

​'Pieces presented as simple, in plain sight yet weighted with symbolism, coded for those open to appreciate the deep-seated in the seemingly superficial. For a work which sits on a surface of a gallery floor​, is also deeply rooted in the subconscious of human survival and stigma.​’ M-A

At first glance, what appears to be a momentary shard of light resting on a floor - a reflection from a series of paintings above deceives the eye and is in fact a mass of confectionery. 

Sun bleached as an outstretched shore - powdery pale as to be made of countless shells - ground down to form a singular land mass. Still and controlled yet symbolic of a process - volatile and destructive, yet presented as a sparkling mirage.

Ivory - the colour of bleached corals which lose pigment as they die, once fluid and ​vital, vivid ​- undulating ​as a textile, become morbidly brittle​ and white. 

A dry landscape of zen, reinterprets nature as eternal,​ maintained by shadows of​ the trusted - mysteriously replenishing a bodies weight - as benign strangers visit with naive intrigue, to collect a souvenir - as a piece of a soul, as to be a canable. No shoots of green spring here only contemplations grown and dissolve as the possibility of thoughts rooted in ​regret.
A wrapper which loses its original purpose to protect becomes an ephemeral debris​ - once its contents is consumed. 

​Pieces presented as simple, in plain sight, yet weighted with symbolism, coded for those open to appreciate the deep-seated in the seemingly superficial. For a work which sits on a surface of a gallery floor​, is also deeply rooted in the subconscious of human survival and stigma.​ 

​Overwhelming​ in scale, as a sh​ocking exposure - seen as a mass of countless units in plain sight - confronts a notion of confession - forcing the eye to glaze in order to ​witness the work as a whole, reduced to a single type - as a verbal narrative distilled to a pertinent concentration. ​As pointalist dots... a​ pox, as a virus which coagulates to form a whole​ - to engule and to be engulfed.​

Symptoms read as provenance - tracing back to origin as forms of remembrance - yet are read as unexpected and intriguing. As the exposure of situations which are hidden from view, as shame - brushed under a carpet. Symbolised as candies readily available and yet are demonised as dangerous, yet remain to continue to tantalise as sparkling choices - pre-packaged and light - yet complex and divisive. 

​Torres' confectionery choice remains a ​forbidden state of mind, an attitude-evoking​ knowing ​metaphor. ​A medium belonging to memory, even whimsy, a specific campness​ which evokes retrospection, and it is this awkward combination which supports an overarching taught atmosphere of the unnatural. A mass of glittering, unclaimed prizes as the contents of a piñata, which remain left behind, as if an event removes the opportunity of life. 

MINIMAL - Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection - Paris, until 26 January 2026.

With thanks: Jessica Seoane.

M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) contemplation and interview series will return in the spring. Thank you for reading.

127. CHANG LING: A SPACE BETWEEN MEMORY AND PROPHECY.

Don Gallery, Freize London.

If My Hometown - Plantain Garden 假如故乡-芭蕉园, CHANG Ling 常陵, 2025. Oil on canvas 布面油画, 162 × 130.8 cm.

‘Unlike the overt expressiveness often found in Western traditions, this seemingly vanishing way of seeing allows the viewer to quietly dissolve into the work through space and light to become, ever so faintly, part of the indistinct crowd.’ L.C.

Seeing your paintings during Frieze London, I was drawn to your paintings which evoked a very specific depth of energy. Directly evoking a link back to the traditions of scroll paintings… Please can you contemplate the works as a series?

‘If My Hometown’ is a body of work I began in 2024. The abstraction of hometown lies within the collective consciousness of each act of looking back. In this new era of AI, the power to compose historical memory and future prophecy is gradually slipping from our hands. ‘If My Hometown’ was born out of this sense of crisis, focusing on the dual immersion—and entanglement—of sovereign consciousness. Can a blurred consciousness still perceive the traces of life we once had?

Your application of colour is arresting, drenched and alive, the sense on seeing the series was radical as the paint still appeared to be wet - not yet fixed... Please can you expand on your reading of time within the creation of this series?

I remember being born in Hualien, Taiwan — a place near the Pacific Ocean filled with banana trees, often the first coastline struck by the warm winds of summer typhoons. No — perhaps I think I remember. Or maybe I was born in Tamsui, a small fishing town in the north. I should ask my elders, or look through childhood photographs. But what if all of that no longer exists...If this is the dual immersion (and dual disorientation) of sovereign consciousness regarding the past and future...

Half hidden within the paintings are tiny scenes which suggest human groups, immediately this tension and dialogue to the community felt important. Please can you expand upon this narrative and symbolism within your practice?

As you’ve observed, I am deeply drawn to subtle, almost elusive modes of depiction. Unlike the overt expressiveness often found in Western traditions, this seemingly vanishing way of seeing allows the viewer to quietly dissolve into the work—through space and light—to become, ever so faintly, part of the indistinct crowd.

I thought as I looked closely into your series of landscapes, how interesting the brush work is, how the paint is applied to the surface and is also pulled away, as a brush that sweeps. Please can you explore your use of implements within your practice, and do you have specific tools which you rely upon?

I have a stand for my tools — it rises like a small mountain, piled with sticky paint, cloth, dried brushes, and others soaking in linseed oil. The air is thick with all kinds of scents. Within about 1.5 meters of reach, everything becomes an intuitive tool at hand. Sometimes there’s no time to select carefully; I simply spread the paint with my hands.

The placement and selection of works presented by Don Gallery at Frieze London were very strong this year. The link to other artists was very well considered and highly sensitive, which added such a tension to the experience of viewing the works... which artists are you drawn to and what do you learn from them?

Don Gallery represents an exceptional group of artists, and I’m honored to exhibit alongside them. I’m particularly drawn to ZHANG Yunyao’s work, with its striking contrasts and cool tonalities, and I also deeply admire ZHANG Ruyi’s pieces — the layered, accumulated cacti are simply mesmerising. She will be presenting her work at this year’s Taipei Biennial.

CHANG Ling, Don Gallery, Frieze London, October 2025.

Chang Ling

With thanks to Silvia Sun at Don Gallery.

126. LYGIA PAPE: A SPACE BETWEEN CONSTRUCTION AND CONCEPTION.

Lygia Pape - Weaving Space, Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection - PARIS.

Lygia Pape, light installation Ttéia 1,C. Pinault Collection Paris. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

As to stand between rain storms, sgraffitoed ​by Dürer - dissipate to nothing - flash back as a lightning bolt crashes and a silence descends. An installation of reenactment, of proposition. Rendered in the materials of man - impersonating a divine intervention. A space between construction and conception.

Witnessing Lygia Papa's installation is to imagine clouds parting as an outpouring of beams, fire down as a curtain of arrows - a torrent of targeted spines - flash to form a sacred atmosphere pierced.

As to stand between rain storms, sgraffitoed ​by Dürer - dissipate to nothing - flash back as a lightning bolt crashes and a silence descends. An installation of reenactment, of proposition. Rendered in the materials of man - impersonating a divine intervention. A space between construction and conception.

The​ taught architecture of angels - angled as a spire -​ pivoting to heaven and anchored to earth - as laser beams which protect and prevent - protrude an air of human - propose a prayer of belief. 

​Unwoven as ​a warp​ framework - the integral mesh of life. Strung as a template - as a constant. Pape's use of copper wire intrigues with complexity - immediacy and spiritual metaphor. A material of unbreakable strength - relied upon for high tolerance under pressure. 

The installation of shafts of light, appear at first momentary, precious and rare, and yet as in life are in fact consistent - the sun continues to shine even when night falls. Pape's use of materials also explore this idea of acceptance - reminding us to witness the presence of now. The use of electrical wires, normally concealed, out of reach within walls, floors and ceilings, in order to conduct electricity safely are instead exposed and presented en masse. Visually minimal as giant jewellery - dazzling to witness and potentially deadly to touch - creating an extraordinary atmosphere conducted from materials traditionally considered ordinary. 

There are parallels to fellow minimalist Dan Flavin, whose luminous atmospheres created with fluorescent tube lighting are reliant on literal electricity to operate. Pape's use of copper wires are disconnected from electrical charge - reliant on positioned overhead spot lights creating a controlled luminosity. Both artists imply faith within their use of light, Flavin's is internal as a sacristy lamp, Pape’s is external as reflected illumination as a ray of light or the gilt edge of a holy book.

Is the work the materials or is the work the environment that the piece sits within, or rather is tied to? Without the physical room, the work would not exist in its current form, it requires a means to keep the wire taught to enable the controlled displacement of lines to be maintained. And so, as with faith, a space is built, to officiate a practice. Is the artists also proposing a question within her series, does art truly exist outside the gallery walls? 

It is interesting to also consider, just as the artist is proposing ideas of faith, positioning, authenticity and value, even after the artist's death in 2004, the work continues to be installed and seen, furthering a point of context and ownership. The lifespan of the artist is transient; the maker is eternal.

Lygia Pape, light installation Ttéia 1,C. Pinault Collection Paris. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

Lygia Pape - Weaving Space, Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection - Paris, until 26 January 2026.

125. VAL LEE: A SPACE BETWEEN MONSTER AND ME.

The Presence of Solitude The Hayward Gallery LONDON.

Val Lee, The Sorrowful Football Team (2025). Courtesy of the artist.

‘I find blind football to be a deeply evocative form of movement. Sighted players blindfold themselves and join fully blind players on the same team, relying on sound to navigate a vast field, running forward without hesitation in the dark. To me, this resonates with something that happens in everyone’s life.’ V.L.

Please can you introduce 'The Presence of Solitude'?

The exhibition can be seen as a visual constellation of performance-based scenarios. One focuses on a fictional blind football team that I formed in Aomori, where we developed movement and listening exercises over two days during a heavy snowstorm. The other centres on an immersive performance in which audiences boarded a minivan and travelled through the mountains together with three masked figures, creating a shared yet solitary experience of movement and landscape.

The sense of implication within the work is fascinating - explored through a juxtaposition of media, which created emotive and physical spaces. Please can you expand upon the sense of implication within your practice? 

I think the monster figure in the exhibition is indeed difficult to fully articulate. Its presence is intensely visual, with a vivid color and imposing scale, and when it moves, it carries a palpable weight. It feels as if it is constantly gazing at you, yet you can never meet its eyes. To me, it embodies a kind of existence that requires no explanation, no justification.

The stones arranged on its shelves also resist clear interpretation; one could say they might stand in for anything. Across countless landscapes, it seems to have gathered stones that are almost devoid of meaning and brought them back to its dwelling. Indeed, stones have appeared in many of my exhibitions. This began more than a decade ago in a performance where a performer quietly took several stones out of their pocket. Later, stones appeared again in exhibitions in Mexico City, Yogyakarta, and London. Yet each time, the context, image, and meaning of the stones were entirely different.

In contrast, the blind football team plays with a ball containing bells, which becomes like another kind of stone, moving quietly through the snow. Many times, the ball can barely move in the snow at all; only the force imparted by the player can propel the ball before them into motion.

The sense of sight is particularly pronounced within the exhibition, from the featureless fringed characters, in the images, on film and represented physically. The football team in the snow, the atmosphere with the dimmed lights - all added to the feeling of watching and being watched... Please can you expand upon the focus of sight within your work? 

Indeed, in my other works, there are also examples where sight becomes a central concern. For instance, in Charting the Contours of Time, presented in Kyoto, visitors enter a completely dark space and confront intense sound, keeping the body in a constant state of tension. Eventually, they look through night-vision goggles at a life-sized replica of the well-known “Human Shadow Etched in Stone” from Hiroshima, a trace believed to have formed at the moment of the atomic explosion when a person’s silhouette was burned onto the stone surface.

Similarly, in Stereoblind, which took place in the main hall of the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, several performers moved among hundreds of visitors. Their actions resembled performance yet could be mistaken for odd, everyday behaviour, creating a state in which viewers could not easily determine whether the figures before them were performing or simply part of the audience.

I find blind football to be a deeply evocative form of movement. Sighted players blindfold themselves and join fully blind players on the same team, relying on sound to navigate a vast field, running forward without hesitation in the dark. To me, this resonates with something that happens in everyone’s life.

The use of a very specific colour palette within the presentation added to the feeling of saturation, both visually and emotionally. The blue of the sky and ocean and the intensity of the use of orange... Please can you contemplate your use of colour within the works presented? 

From the material choices in costume design to filming, and finally to colour grading, each step involved careful discussion. It is difficult to fully explain how we think about colour, but I can say that the monster emerges from the mountains, and its presence needs to feel very strong. In that sense, part of its colour echoes the tones of the mountains, yet another part feels entirely foreign to them.

Leaving the space, I felt as though I was returning, even escaping from a trip - I felt somehow released from an experience which was both physical while also being reliant on the imagination, entranced within the music... the experience has stayed with me - disturbing and exhilarating my thoughts... Please can you expand upon your decision-making regarding the realisation of this work? 

I feel that both groups of characters in the exhibition are in constant motion. Even the monster playing music seems to exist in an endless loop. To me, they form a universe charged with intense kinetic energy, yet are presented either in complete stillness or through moving images.

The decision-making process relied heavily on discussions with the Hayward Gallery team. For me, a floor plan alone is not always helpful, but the curator, Yung Ma, would suggest what would work best in terms of bodily perception — for example, choosing between projecting onto plywood or adjusting the height of the projection. The technical team, including Chris Spear, also provided measurements and advice based on the physical space and viewing angles on site. As a result, this work was largely shaped remotely first, then refined through cloud-based discussions, and only finally embedded into the physical space, element by element.

Val Lee, Valley of the Minibus (2025). Photo by Pitzu Liu, courtesy the artist.

Val Lee: The Presence of Solitude, The Hayward Gallery. Until 11 January 2026.

Thank you: Megan Edwards.

124. NINGDE WANG: A SPACE BETWEEN MATTER AND MEMORY.

Paris Photo Preview

The Deluge, detail, 15632864Z 大洪水15632864Z, WANG Ningde 王宁德, 2024. Photographic paper, modulated printing inks applied by artist 相纸、艺术家调配打印墨水堆积, 155 × 286 cm. Image courtesy of the artist and Don Gallery.

‘As ‘Deluge’ observes, time is not an external flow but a process of constant generation, unfolding, and transformation. When plants leave their traces in water and light, they undergo a metamorphosis from matter to memory. In observing, waiting, and even listening to them as they dry, I too am shaped by time.’ N.W.

Seeing your work at Frieze in London, I was immediately amazed at the beauty of 'The Deluge'. Please can you introduce the work and how it came into being?

'The Deluge' draws its imagery from nature. Plants are collected, preserved as specimens, soaked, and dried until their forms are finally fixed onto photographic paper. The studio where the works are made is on an island in my hometown, located in northeastern China, near North Korea; looking at a map, it is also not far from Japan. I grew up there and am intimately familiar with the scents of these plants, their germination seasons, blooming periods, and the ways they wither. To me, they are not anonymous natural objects, but companions of my childhood. In the work, the plants are not “painted” by me; their forms are shaped collaboratively by flowing water, pigments, and time, as if they develop themselves, leaving traces on the photographic paper.

The context of a meadow is very evocative, the mix of foliage, forming a tonality, feels like a memory and yet the work is made using photography techniques, how does your relationship with your work change over time?

Plants transform from living branches and leaves into specimens, leaving behind only their shadows. This process often lasts for weeks, sometimes even longer. During this time, I am both observer and companion. The contours and textures left by the plants capture their natural progression—from fullness to dryness, from saturation to decay—and serve as evidence of their existence in the world, as well as slices of time. Moreover, the temperature, humidity, air currents, and even sounds during this period can leave traces within the work.

Sometimes, a leaf might curl suddenly with a change in humidity, or a specimen absorbing pigment will emit a faint “whispering” sound. In autumn, the studio is filled with the scent of daisies and oak leaves, and these aromas also become part of the work. In this process, I too inhabit the same span of time, quietly dissolving into the textures of the plants. My presence—my breathing, waiting, and sense of loss—is embedded alongside them. I share a fluid temporality with the plants: time is no longer merely an external, passing dimension, but a material state inscribed on the photographic paper by water, plants, and air. Each work becomes a manuscript of time, written collectively by water, light, and air.

The depth of tone within the work evokes time in a very particular way, the sense of fading away... of what remains... the implied space created within the work of removal feels particularly pronounced, please can you expand on the atmosphere created within The Deluge?

During the making of The Deluge, I often venture alone deep into the forest. Nature can be at once profoundly silent and softly murmuring, always narrating its own life stories. Plants engage in subtle and complex interactions with the air, light, and humidity. They capture sunlight and provide energy for all living things. Each plant perceives light and gravity in its own way; their forms appear still, yet they are continuously generating — a slow, almost imperceptible process of becoming that I aim to capture in my work.

The placement of plants may seem random, yet it carries an inherent order, a logic of its own. Amid my own breathing, they reveal the rhythms of life. The air, the scents, make me certain that early humans must have witnessed the same scenes; the breath of the forest, even as civilisation progresses, remains unchanged.

In nature, in the depths of the mountains and forests, breath becomes a language shared between humans and plants, allowing true communication. Plants are not merely objects to be observed; they absorb, transform, and release, filling the air with the vibrations of life. “Nature” is no longer an external object, but a continuously generating whole. Here, water, light, air, plants, and humans share the same material time; human existence depends on these living beings.

As ‘Deluge’ observes, time is not an external flow but a process of constant generation, unfolding, and transformation. When plants leave their traces in water and light, they undergo a metamorphosis from matter to memory. In observing, waiting, and even listening to them as they dry, I too am shaped by time.

As an image-based artist, I once took pride in creating natural images without relying on the element of “light” in photography. Yet deep in the forest, I witnessed the light I had previously excluded—it is hidden within the growth of the plants, within the energy they provide to humans. Only through humble listening and quiet attention can one truly communicate with nature.

I feel that the reference of nature within painting is becoming more and more focused upon in this time period, maybe this is a reaction to so many years of digital obsession. Why are you drawn to natural references?

The Deluge series began during the pandemic. During that time, we were forced to remain still, fixed within a confined space like plants. This made me look at the surrounding landscape anew, trying to understand it from the perspective of life itself.

Through evolution, plants have given up mobility, often remaining rooted in one place, silent for their entire lifespan. They perceive the world through roots, stomata, light, and humidity - not through consciousness, but through a “responsive” intelligence. In ways beyond our comprehension, they manifest the brilliance of life.

In Eastern art traditions, plants are not merely objects to be observed; they are embodiments of life itself. Nature is often personified and spiritualised, serving as an externalisation of the mind and a visual expression of cosmological philosophy. In Chinese painting, plants are frequently personified or symbolised: pine, bamboo, plum, orchid, and chrysanthemum convey not only the cycles of the seasons but also ideals of personal cultivation and virtue. In Korean painting, nature is viewed through the lens of “self-cultivation,” imbuing it with ethical meaning plants are both living beings and symbols of morality. Japanese painting apprehends nature through the concept of “emptiness,” expressing impermanence and tranquillity.

We often treat nature as mere background, yet plants remind me that they are not “there”; they share this moment with us. Their sense of time differs from ours, yet it is more profound. They do not seek meaning, but continuously generate it. When I work with them, I am not “depicting” them; I am attuning myself to a non-human rhythm.

During that period, paying attention to these overlooked or forgotten landscapes guided me to look back, to trace the depths of memory to my hometown, extending into mountains and forests. This is not romantic nostalgia, but a return to the smallest units of life, the earliest language, and the oldest temporal structures.

This can also be seen as a reflection on digital culture and “anthropocentric narratives.” In the silence of plants, I come to understand “existence” anew: not as conscious possession, but as continuous mutual manifestation with the world.

Your use of colour is very specific, the way the fluid layers pool into degradé shades is sensational, please can you expand upon your relationship with colour?

In my method, water serves both as a medium and as a recorder of time. I usually select a single tonal colour, allowing the water to seep, gather, and evaporate naturally within the structure of the plants and paper—the colour is not merely a decorative element of visual language, but a self-operating system. It diffuses according to humidity, gravity, and the direction of the paper fibers, emerging slowly like the gentle rhythm of breathing.

Merleau-Ponty suggested that colour is not a fixed property of objects, but a phenomenon revealed by the world itself through perception. Each time water carrying pigment flows across the body of a plant, it becomes an exchange of perception—I observe how the water “thinks” and how the pigment independently decides the boundaries where it will settle.

This state resonates with the concept of “wu wei”(non-action) in Eastern philosophy does not mean inaction, but allowing action to follow the natural rhythm, letting things determine themselves. When colour flows freely and diffuses, it reveals forms more complex and honest than expected; colour ceases to be merely a means of expression and becomes a manifestation of the material itself.

The Deluge 15632864Z 大洪水15632864Z, WANG Ningde 王宁德, 2024. Photographic paper, modulated printing inks applied by artist 相纸、艺术家调配打印墨水堆积,155 × 286 cm. Courtesy of the artist and Don Gallery. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) Frieze London, October 2025.

Ningde Wang, Don Gallery, Booth D32.

Paris Photo, 12-16, November 2025. Grand Palais, 3 avenue du Général Eisenhower, 75008, Paris.

Thank you Silvia Sun.

123. CARTIER: A SPACE BETWEEN HOROLOGY AND HYPNAGOGIA.

CARTIER, Victoria and
Albert Museum - LONDON.

Crash wristwatch, Cartier London, 1967. Yellow and rosegold, saphire and leather straps; 4.25 × 2.5 cm. Cartier Collection. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

‘Is Crash a work of anti-jewellery? Questioning the very status and foundations of the society and clientele to whom Cartier sought to entice?’ M-A

Presented within the Victoria and Albert Museums’ exhibition of Cartier's most iconic pieces, Crash wristwatch appears more as a piece of evidence than an item of haute horology. The timepiece is radical for reasons not due to its scale or use of precious materials, its provenance or owner, but because of its startling use of conceptual thought. Possibly the most radical element of its realisation is what this tiny creation of jewellery proposes, not what it physically is. 

Crash explores the immediacy of surrealism with a trick of the eye, the design utilises the Cartier iconography of fine jewellery, subverted with a technique which assumes a position of surprise, even shock; the punk notion of destruction, presented as perfect. This oxymoronic notion, which contradicts expectations, immediately throws what is considered to be normal into question, and so Cartier's bold move, created within the tiny proportions of a wristwatch, has gone on to perplex and seduce for nearly 60 years since its first release. 

A sense of perversion is scintillating within the design of Crash, the timepiece must have unerved and excited the bourgeois who relied upon the storied maison to invest and adorn their lives, continuing to set an aspirational tone which suddenly involved a sense of contraction. The tension sensed within Luis Buñuel's erotic cinematic masterwork Belle de Jour, starring Catherine Deneuve, which was also presented in 1967, supported a cultural shift towards the deconstruction of social hierarchies. The film was considered outrageous because it explored taboo themes such as sexual deviancy. Depicting a wealthy woman indulging in sexual fantasies that were both sordid and surreal, challenging the hypocritical sexual double standards of the era.

Surely informed by the surrealist movements’ symbolic depictions of reality, directly linking back to the DADA concept of anti-art, the new surrealism of the nineteen sixties seems to expand this idea beyond the avant-garde of the gallery walls and into the cabinets of products and the lives of the general public. Is Crash a work of anti-jewellery? Questioning the very status and foundations of the society and clientele to whom Cartier sought to entice?

Is Crash also a collision, not between objects but a space outside of them - a rupture of time. The watchface appears to be stretched wide, breaking every rule for a timepiece previously created by the Maison - A timepiece whose face, a challenge to read, yet immediately understood as being for those who do not follow rules set by the past, rather seeing time as a fluid notion. 

A typeface of empire - The designs' roman numerals appear to sink with gravity, stretching downwards as to melt like the camembert, which supposedly inspired Salvador Dali's 1931 painting 'Persistence of Memory', where a series of clockfaces melt within a landscape, a form seemingly mirrored within Cartier's wrist watch design. 

Memories do persist within the storied Maison and Crash arrives at a jarring ripple on a surface historically maintained as calm control. The tenets of Cartier are recognisable and intact, the use of precious metals, the refined detailing of craft and precision all present and yet appear ruptured to unnerve with exhilarating effect - out of control, out of time, and yet perfectly aligned to its moment of creation. 

It is only in London, from Cartier's trio of bases, that could produce such a symbol of change, such a talisman of revolt. Created from the workroom of a city in flux - an identity forged from the very tension between following and breaking rules. Too audacious for New York and unthinkable for Paris, Crash remains true to a London style, forever belonging to a youthful resistance to time. 

CARTIER - Victoria and Albert Museum - LONDON. Until 16 November 2025.

With thanks to Tallulah Timoko.

122. RICHARD AVEDON: A SPACE BETWEEN VISIBLE AND INVISIBLE.

Richard Avedon: In the American West - Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson - PARIS.

Richard Avedon, Sandra Bennett, twelve year old, Rocky Ford, Colorado, August 23, 1980 © The Richard Avedon Foundation

In 1979, at the height of his career, Richard Avedon, the most famous fashion image maker in the world, embarked on a series of pictures that were to become among the most influential portfolios of portraits ever recorded. His subjects were not the supermodels and cultural figureheads for whom he was best known, but of residents of the American West, far from the bright lights of New York - his subjects were the people who worked in slaughterhouses and mines, in oil fields and on ranches. Housewives, waitresses, truck drivers, farmers, cowboys, drifters and prisoners... 

Two photography assistants accompanied him, as sheets of paper were stuck to outside walls as backdrops for on-the-road, open-air studios, distilling his images to elemental, indelible and evidential.

The first portrait within the 'In The American West' series was taken in March 1979, the last in October 1984, over the course of roughly 5.5 years, portraying 752 people in 189 cities and towns across 17 states. 103 portraits were selected for the final exhibition and catalogue. 

Within the same period, Richard Avedon continued to make work for advertisers and Vogue magazine, including campaign imagery for fashion houses Versace and Calvin Klein. Photographing teenage star Brooke Shields in a series of controversial images where the 15 year old actor famously quips "You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing". In the same year of 1980, Avedon was to photograph, possibly the most famous portrait within 'In The American West' series, a portrait of a 12 year old girl named Sandra Bennett. The parallels between the two portraits are interesting to contrast; both images depict girlhood in different guises, with one created to sell clothing and depicting a revision of the American identity. The fitted dark indigo jeans, polished Cuban heeled boots and unbuttoned blouse worn by Shields echo the workwear of the people who mined the American West for natural resources. 

The portrait of Bennett, also photographed in denim and of a similar age to the Hollywood star, possibly shows a far more complex narrative than that of Shields. Who playfully is depicted in the guise of what the Calvin Klein consumer probably imagined the American West to encompass: romance. Bennett's 12-year-old eyes are full of the reality of life where the option to imagine another identity is not afforded; her denim workwear is fit for purpose, not for fashion. 

Richard Avedon, Sandra Bennett, twelve year old, Rocky Ford, Colorado, August 23, 1980 © The Richard Avedon Foundation

Richard Avedon, In the American West, April 30 - October 12, 2025. Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson.

121. DANIEL OBASI: A SPACE BETWEEN CONVERGENCE AND A NEW DAWN.

‘We are more than what we are today or yesterday or even tomorrow… my work communicates faith. A belief in how every one of us can do anything.’

D.O

Daniel Obasi, "Beautiful Resistence', 2020, Lagos.

DANIEL OBASI

To read the full interview with Daniel Obasi, collect the new issue of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4: Signals. Available from 18 stockists including maaspacebetween.com, The Serpentine, Jeu De Paume and Dover Street Market.

120. FELIPE ROMERO BELTRÁN: A SPACE BETWEEN SUSPENSION AND WAITING.

​From the first encounter of a work by Felipe Romero Beltrán, time seems to pause. His process of dissolving into atmospheres manages to translate heartbeats of waiting for a moment which may never arrive - a time held as a witnessed prayer.

Felipe Romero Beltrán, BODIES_Grecia Evangelina. Thom’s house, 2021-2024, lambda print, 120 x 150 cm. © Felipe Romero Beltrán.

‘Migration is a thread that runs through all my work. I’m interested not only in the politics of borders but in how migration reshapes identity, language, and gesture.’ F.R.B.

Please introduce your latest body of work and publication: Bravo.

Bravo (2021–24), published by Loose Joints and presented at Fundación MAPFRE, is a photographic essay on the Rio Bravo/Rio Grande border between Mexico and the United States. The project unfolds in a landscape marked by suspension and waiting: people who arrive at this river often spend months or years in limbo, never certain if the crossing will happen. The work is structured in three movements – Closures, Bodies, Breaches – combining interiors, portraits, and landscapes. Though the river is central, it rarely appears directly; it exists as absence, limit, and political force.

The idea of re-enactment of events, of role play, of performance within your work is fascinating and something that you continue to explore... 

Performance and re-enactment are central strategies in my practice. In Dialect (2020–2023), I worked with migrants coming from Morocco in Seville, I worked with the structure of theatrical acts: bodies in gestures of waiting, resistance, or play, staged on scenes they've experienced it.

Later works such as Recital (2020), the same guys read aloud from Spain’s immigration law, showing the struggle between the body and the language, and Instrucción (2022–2024), a collaboration with dancers to recreate the embodied memory of dinghy crossings, extend this performative dimension. Reenactment is not about representation but about re-inscribing bodily memory: how gestures and roles can speak to law, borders, and the politics inscribed on the body.

Felipe Romero Beltrán, Untitled, from the series Dialect, 2020-2023. Courtesy by the artist, Hatch Gallery & Klemm’s Berlin. © Felipe Romero Beltrán.

The focus of migration and the influence of it within your work and practice appears to continue to be very important to you...

Migration is a thread that runs through all my work. I’m interested not only in the politics of borders but in how migration reshapes identity, language, and gesture. In Dialect, the focus was the Strait of Gibraltar as a site of passage, with young migrants negotiating legal limbo in Spain. In Bravo, the Rio Bravo is both obstacle and horizon. These projects are less about documenting a condition than about creating a visual and performative space in which to reflect on waiting, displacement, and the transformation of the body under migration regimes.

When we first met at the Circulation(s) festival in Paris some years ago I remember your extraordinary ability to breach spaces - to join different states of consciousness within one image, the melding of a present and the sense of memory while also pushing into new territory which felt like a proposal... 

That idea of “breach” resonates deeply. In Bravo, “breaches” refers both to wounds on the body and to the informal paths migrants take to approach the river. It’s a liminal state – not only geographic but also temporal and perceptual. My images aim to hold that doubleness: they are traces of what has already occurred (an empty room, a mattress) but also openings toward what could come. This is what you describe: a simultaneous sense of memory and projection. I see photography as a tool for proposing new visual and political imaginaries, for breaching the fixed categories of documentary, art, and performance.

One of the visual hallmarks of your work is gesture and grace, I remember that sense from meeting you the first time also…

Grace, for me, is not about beauty in a traditional sense, but about the dignity of these gestures, the persistence of bodies under constraint. In conditions of migration, law, and waiting, grace is a form of survival, the body’s way of holding itself in time.

Felipe Romero Beltrán, Untitled, from the series Dialect, 2020-2023. Courtesy by the artist, Hatch Gallery & Klemm’s Berlin. © Felipe Romero Beltrán.

Felipe Romero Beltrán — Dialect, MEP - 5/7 rue de Fourcy 75004 Paris. 15 Oct - 7 Dec 2025.

Felipe Romero Beltrán - BRAVO, Museum of Contemporary Art, Place de la Maison Carrée - 30000 Nîmes. 8 Oct 2025 - 29 March 2026.

Felipe Romero Beltrán - Hatch & Klemm's - Photo Paris, Grand Palais, 13-16 Nov 2025.

M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4 is available here, along with 18 international stockists, including The Serpentine, Tender, Magalleria, Jeu de Paume and Dover Street Market.

Felipe Romero Beltrán is a contributing artist to M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 2.

119. COMME DES GARÇONS A SPACE BETWEEN ICONOGRAPHY AND ICONOLOGY.

Printemps/Ete 2026 - PARIS.

Look 8, Comme des Garçons, pretemps/ete 2026. Image courtesy of Comme des Garçons.

Textures of dough, implied and inferred motions of kneading as well as needing, waiting, rising,​ knocking back - as with the stages of life, shifts in progression, and a space between moving forward and looking back. ​As the yeasts which enable ancient starters to continue, to ferment and produce complexities of favour due to diverse and variable natures, so too does Rei Kawakubo extract from the auras of the past to form the nutrition of next.

The notion of humble means and domestic provisions, made in preparation for sustaining life over celebration of it. In Kawakubo's hands - these quiet forms usher past - alert to temperature and temperament - spongey to the eye but fragile to touch. Sparse in decoration, the two dozen looks were delicate as Delft, unglazed and porous as a bisque firing. White washed and awaiting. Their loose, tied volumes as protective covers - coatings of contents appeared more as a metaphor for containers than decorative distractions. Threads frayed from edges ripped by hand, suggestive of rags stowed for repetitive use for domestic labour - re-presented as collages of scrim, or the horse hair inners to upholstery - normally invisible to eyes expectant of status. A state of unseen was prevalent, a space akin to a vacated storage room, fluorescent lights flatly illuminated the procession with unemotive glare, flickering off to blackness when the last model departed.

A historic language of hats, further forms an echo to a past, loaded with symbolism, possibly to C17th Holland, where a series of high-brimmed versions constructed from what appeared to be traditional fine gauge rafia and moleskin - immediately suggesting reference to the famed portraits of Dutch gentry by Rembrandt and Cornelius van der Voort. Artists whose work is now considered more a gestural depiction of the subjects than a faithful representation of reality, and so does Kawakubo, where hats arrived torn and collapsed as to suggest prior trauma, surely metaphors of now. And it is here that Kawakubo brilliantly pulls a thread from both a textile of time and the repetition of history, questioning status and the stigmas attached to the etiquette of dress and society. Both Rembrandt and Kawakubo define richly internalised bodies of work, utilising media to actively interrogate portraits of a time lived, while reducing decorative elements to intensify a personal narrative and connection. Within a collection which drew upon a state of process and distress, the Japanese creator further defined a mirror to now, the glass seemingly dusty with remnants of atmospheres, which both enchanted and disturbed. 

Silhouettes, pale and ghostly, fathomed from forms which explored notions of hierarchy and privacy, continued this visual conversation of volatility, from shapes which actively appeared to inpersonate the determination and voluminous status swathes of historic nobility. At other moments, these paddings and draperies fell as to suggest disorder, disturbing surfaces to be exposed in permanence within fluctuating states. Works also inspired thoughts of storage, even choice of restoration - further connecting to fabrications which appeared as internal structures, or furniture exposed as a humble ergonomic form when removed from exterior layers of protection. And yet the 24 elements within this presentation did not feel vulnerable - exposing something which is normally unseen - raw, intensified and growing as fibres beneath ground level, as roots which draw nutrition from decomposed materials of the past in order to survive moving forward.

Comme des Garçons

Thank you Thomas and Daisy.

M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4 is available here, along with 18 international stockists, including The Serpentine, Tender, Magalleria, Jeu de Paume and Dover Street Market.

118. JOY JULIUS: A SPACE BETWEEN CONTROL AND RELEASE.

​A series of portraits by Joy Julius open M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4. 'Lagos Market' is interspersed with imagery by Georges Seurat and Michaël Borremans; this cross-reference highlights notions of movement and pause, identity and purpose. Through the frame of Julius, we become a part of the noise of a busy street scene, scanning for signals...

Joy Julius, Lagos Market, 2024. From a series published within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN). Image courtesy of Joy Julius.

‘The Lagos series was a chance to observe instead of create, to respond rather than control. But I think that sense of precision and care still comes through, just through a different medium. It was about finding my language, even in a space as layered and unpredictable as the Lagos market.’ J.J.

Joy Julius, Lagos Market, 2024. From a series published within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN). Above image unpublished. Image courtesy of Joy Julius.

Please introduce your images from the Lagos market series.


This series began pretty instinctively. I didn’t set out with a big concept; I just decided to be present and document things that I felt drawn to every day while moving through Lagos. 
I kept noticing patterns, colours, people, how they moved, what they wore, the Danfos (vibrant yellow and orange buses) and the brightness of the fruits in the market. Over time, I realised I wasn’t just photographing a place, but a sensitivity, memory, nostalgia. Seeing through the lens of someone returning, someone in-between places, as someone from the diaspora.

I remember first seeing some images from this series when we were installing an exhibition together of 140 designers work at The Royal College of Art last summer - and I kept seeing these little orange buses and cars in amongst all the other images... and I didn't know it was your work at first, as I knew you as the person I remember meeting in tutorials and talking about tailoring... and then I remember becoming immediately very sure that I wanted to see everything from this series...this is an extraordinary series.


Yes definitely, especially coming from someone who knew me mainly through the lens of tailoring. I think people sometimes expect you to fit neatly into one thing, designer, photographer, stylist, but for me, those practices have always been connected. The Lagos series was a chance to observe instead of create, to respond rather than control. But I think that sense of precision and care still comes through, just through a different medium. It was about finding my language, even in a space as layered and unpredictable as the Lagos market.

Your work as a designer is very precise, you are very clear with what you want and yet this series of pictures seems to engage with your ability to distil a time in another context, also in a very specific way, but also in a way where you observed others...


That’s something I’ve thought about a lot. In design, I’m building a world, constructing silhouettes and creating systems. But with this work, I had to surrender a bit. Let the serendipity of events and surroundings guide me. I was stepping in and choosing to really see, not overthink, just trusting what I was drawn to and allowing instinct to lead.

I focused on details that struck me, without needing to justify why. I still looked for balance, texture, and mood. So even though I was simply observing, I was still composing, aiming to capture an image that felt right.

Shooting in the streets of Lagos, especially in the markets, also comes with its own risks. Photography isn’t always welcomed, so a lot of the time I had to hide the camera and just hope for the best. That tension between control and release, intention and chance, is something I think really lives in the series.

I have looked at these pictures over and over again and they seem to change each time. The compositional structure is extraordinary... What do these pictures mean to you?


I’ve spent a lot of my life moving between places. I hold on to memories of growing up in Nigeria, and those memories often show up in my work. But after being away for so long, I realised I was mostly using the same references as everyone else.

So I decided I needed to go back and do my own research. To move past just memories and really connect with what Nigeria feels like to me now. These pictures are part of that. They’re my way of documenting real, recent observations and reflecting on them in ways that continue to shape my work.

What are your signals for change?


Change usually shows up when something feels off, like I’m settling for less, or when something new catches my attention. I try to notice and trust those feelings, even if I don’t get them straight away. Often, I just need some time to sort things out clearly so I can keep moving my work forward. And usually, in the end, every change and shift makes sense.

Joy Julius, Lagos Market, 2024. From a series published within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN). Still life image by Harry Nathan.

Joy Julius is a contributing artist to the 4th issue of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN), available here along with 18 international stockists including The Serpentine, Village, Tender, Magalleria, Jeu de Paume and Dover Street Market.

With thanks to Zowie Broach.

M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) will return with more interviews and contemplations in the autumn. Thank you for reading.

117. JOE BRADLEY: A SPACE BETWEEN EXHILARATION AND EXHAUSTION.

Animal Family, David Zwirner - London.

Joe Bradley, You & I, 2025, Oil on Canvas. 231.1 X 190.8cm. Image courtesy of David Zwirner.

Joe Bradley's saturated series of new paintings appear as freeze frames of avant-garde cartoons - as black outlined petri-dishes violently teeming, demanding our attention. Suites of canvases contribute to an atmosphere of parade at peak, a piñata at busting, a sugar high pre low. And yet what is Bradley's Animal Family signifying? And why are these works being presented now?

Bradley, a key member of the art world’s third generation of abstract expressionists, stands in front of 'Good World', a richly concentrated canvas which immediately evokes the heritage of the art period which he loves. A period, originally formed between the mid 1940s and 1950s. Predominantly based in New York by a collective of names, many of whom fled Nazi occupied Europe during World War two for the freedom of the United States. Creating works which were a catharsis to the horrors experienced in their home nations. 

New York, the original centre of abstract expressionism, is also the home of Bradley, who’s returning focus of maps defiantly outlined in black, is first seen in 'Good World' - a patchwork of impasto blocked colour - layered to form a patina, an interplay - a cacophony - a visual slice of hysteria, with no sense of beginning nor end. We are viewing a moment which seems to be sustained throughout the twelve exhibited paintings, a technique of composition at first exhilarating and also exhausting.

Many techniques employed within the dozen canvases are actively borrowed from the roll call of artistic forefathers, he freely admits to being influenced by. Francis Picarbi’s 1940s monsters, Philip Guston 'my god - an uncomplicated love affair', Alexander Calder’s 'a big touch stone... a reaction to evil'...even using the same proportions as Willem de Kooning for a series of paintings; 'it sounded like a challenge'. The artist freely quotes from his heroes, Guston once said - 'When a painting feels hopeless, it is often the best one - as you don't have an attachment to it - to work on a painting without reservation... a painting which surpasses - has to feel unfamiliar and yet authentically its own.’ 

A returning sense of what appears to be cartography forms the focus of the most sustained and resolved works on show, the connection to nationality, state lines, border control and coded politics which surround these decisions seems an irresistible assumption regarding context, and yet are not mentioned within the narration offered by the artist. A scattering of stars and daisies fall as confetti over the four strongest paintings seen, tethering the collection as a whole, and offering a much-needed respite to the overt bombardment of energy witnessed. 

The sense of timing and time delay is fascinating, whereas Bradley's fraternity of chosen family forefathers were known to create to the improvisation of jazz, the undulations and hypnotic rhythms which pulse through Picarbia... Calder's orchestral arches and Guston's rumbunctious percussion appear more as samples to Bradley's hip hop. Blaring colours distract from any sense of respite, proposing a question of why a state of nostalgia not lived by the artist first-hand is relevant at a time where so much needs to be addressed? It is this point that Bradley exposes, a line of modernity, a possible vulnerability, signifying a truth which, in contrast to his bombastic paintings, at times reveals possible signals, half hidden - and yet in plain sight.

Joe Bradley, David Zwirner Gallery, 11 June 2025. Image: M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

Joe Bradley, David Zwirner, Until 1st August 2025.

With thanks Sara Chan.

116. LIDEWIJ EDELKOORT: A SPACE BETWEEN CALL AND RESPONSE.

‘I came to the conclusion that maybe our instinct and intuition are not really ours, and that it is actually a universal thing… It is the collective thought process… And that we are just allowed to connect ourselves to the bigger whole.’

L.E.

To read the full interview with Lidewij Edelkoort, see the new issue of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4: Signals. Available from 18 stockists including maaspacebetween.com, The Serpentine, Jeu De Paume and Dover Street Market.

Join Lidewij Edelkoort in person for her Autumn / Winter 2026/7 Seminar on July 17th, 2025, Chelsea College of Arts.

115. JOEY ZHONG: A SPACE BETWEEN SEARCH AND BELONGING.

An interview with jeweller Joey Zhong - Jewellery Market Summer Exhibition - Dover Street Market - LONDON.

Joey Zhong, ‘Wrapped Topaz Ring’, sterling silver, white topaz, copper, 2024. Image originally by Joey Zhong - reprinted for a limited edition book for the Jewellery Market Summer Exhibition for Dover street Market, London, featuring 34 emergent designers, curated by Mimi Hoppen.

…My pieces tell a personal story of my family’s journey of migration from China to Australia… It is through motifs of basketry and the idea of seeds scattering that I visualise diaspora; a physical and metaphorical journey of the search for belonging. J.Z.

What is your relationship with jewellery and what does it mean for you as an object?

The very nature of jewellery is intimate, in the way it is crafted, acquired, and worn. It is arguably one of the most intimate of objects. It is layered with meaning.

Jewellery, for me, is about storytelling. As a designer and artist, jewellery is a medium through which poetic understandings of people, objects and place are translated. I see my pieces as metaphors that speak to explorations of identity and shared human experiences. I design and create wearable objects of art that aim to find resonance with people through tactility and the adornment of the body. There is a vulnerable beauty in the passing of a narrative from the artist to the viewer or wearer — a symbiosis where meaning is reinterpreted, allowing a story to form a life of its own. 

You have a particular approach to using certain materials within your practice…

I have a fascination with objects made for holding and carrying. They serve as a metaphor for paths travelled. The need to hold and carry is embodied through the craft of basketry, a process that is inseparable from the hands that weave it. In my recent work, my pieces tell a personal story of my family’s journey of migration from China to Australia. I developed experimental ways of setting gemstones that reference traditional methods of weaving and wrapping. Here, gemstones and pearls play the role of seeds. It is through these motifs of basketry and the idea of seeds scattering that I visualise diaspora; a physical and metaphorical journey of the search for belonging. Dispersing from their homeland, the journey of the seed is like the migration of people: the carrying of belongings, memory and a longing for home.

My practice embodies my interpretation of jewellery as a celebration of artistry and sensibility towards materiality. The true beauty and value lie within the treatment of a material, in the ability to highlight a material’s natural beauty. I do so in the sensitive weaving of materials and gemstones. I bring together my appreciation of traditional jewellery craftsmanship with the language of contemporary design and a desire to weave jewellery convention into something new.

What have been your signalling moments of learning within your creative journey?

I think the wonderful thing about the creative journey is the endless learning. Learning through action, but also through observations of art, history, culture and interactions of the everyday. 

A specific moment that opened my eyes to what jewellery could be resided in the pages of a book, stumbled across at the Central Saint Martins library. I remember finding ‘Unclasped: Contemporary British Jewellery’ (Costin, Gilhooley, 1997), during my first year in London while studying my Foundation Diploma. At the time, I was still trying to find where I could see myself situated in the creative context. As soon as I started looking through the book, I was completely mesmerised by the striking images of silver wires, seemingly pierced through the mouth and neck. It was, of course, the work of Shaun Leane for Alexander McQueen. Seeing Shaun’s work truly unlocked a path of discovery into this incredible world of jewellery, which could be macabre but beautiful, fashion yet reminiscent of traditional jewellery craftsmanship. Full of contradiction and contrast yet harmonious. It was a signalling moment that led me to pursue jewellery design. It challenged everything I thought I understood about jewellery, and it still excites me today.

I have since had the chance to express my admiration to Shaun in person, as I had the opportunity to learn from and work alongside him during an internship in 2023. It was every bit as magical and surreal as I thought it would be.

Do you have certain pieces of jewellery which you wear, and if so, can you express how they came into your life?

I can’t quite recall much jewellery being worn amongst my family growing up, or be able to pinpoint specific pieces of jewellery. It is an interesting realisation to be had. Perhaps the most meaningful pieces of jewellery to me are those that are not so often worn but can be found stored carefully at home, each with memories attached. 

I have a very close relationship with my grandparents. They immigrated to Australia to care for me when I was born, and they have indelibly shaped who I am. I attribute much of my early creative curiosity to my grandma. I have fond memories of her making beaded rings, bracelets and necklaces, which she learned at our local community centre. She would make them for me to wear and even more for me to gift to my friends. There was a chunky pink lariat, rings in the shape of flowers and bracelets where strands of beads wove in and out of each other. They were made using ordinary, affordable plastic beads. I rediscovered them on my most recent visit home. I adore them not because of their material value, but because of the hands that crafted them. I have kept them for so long that the nylon threads had become brittle, so much so that some of the pieces snapped when I tried to pick them up, with beads scattering everywhere. I think there is beauty in their interaction with time.

What are your signals for change? 

The beauty of change lies in its nonlinearity, unpredictability and open-endedness. Sometimes, the signals for change occur quite intuitively. In a particular moment in time, I might be guided towards a new direction that simply feels right. It is a feeling that sometimes escapes the confines of rationality. At other times, obstacles are encountered that necessitate adaptation. These often initially present as a failure or setback, but I choose to see these moments as a chance for reorientation. If it were thought of as a line between comfort and fear, when given the choice, I try to follow the path that challenges me more.

Change is inevitable. It is a matter of whether you choose to fight or embrace it. 

Extracted pages of a limited edition book by Joe Richards, made for the exhibition featuring works by 34 jewellery designers, including Caitlin Murphy, Joey Zhong, Els Op de Beeck, Emily Francis Barrett, Jet MCQUISTON and Miya Kumo. Available from Dover Street Market, London.

JOEY ZHONG

Jewellery Market Summer Exhibition - Dover Street Market London - Until 4th August 2025. Curated by Mimi Hoppen.

With thanks to Dickon Bowden, Mimi Hoppen, Daisy Hoppen, Richard Windsor and Lixx Dias and DSM London.

M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) Issue 4: Signals is available now.

114: COMME DES GARÇONS A SPACE BETWEEN BEING AND BECOMING.

A contemplation of Comme Des Garçons Homme Plus Spring Summer 2026 show - PARIS.

Look 6: Comme Des Garçons Homme Plus, Spring Summer 2026, Friday 27 June 2025.

There is a palpable sense of discovery while watching work by Rei Kawakubo, presented for the first time. To witness the release of identity clothed as real, formed into focus, as a mirror held high to a future which echoes a past in a holding space ahead of time. A mirror held by one pair of hands.

This new view manages to override and detect what cannot be forged or replicated, continuing a personal process which tangibly defies a modern age fear within an industry nervous of its future - how to create an AI-proof creative system - And yet I doubt if this was the intention or care for Kawakubo, whose methodologies to create actively interrogates the artificial and the intellectual.

And yet this codex of visual facets both provokes a want to decipher while also remaining ambivalent to such cues - a work with its own a soul, which seems to shrug off any such need to be understood. As the presentation concludes, the lights switch off, I detect there are no questions for a body of work that seems so complete. To begin to pull at these conceptual threads somehow seems to undermine the work’s purpose and personal objective, more therapy of understanding than a need to be understood.

It is within this sixth sense that the work lives first (a title for the archival publications the brand offered its customers within its stores in the late 1980s). This sense of instinct becomes even more pronounced when seeing works move, as if freshly hatched - live - as alter egos birthed within a need for survival - a procession of visual signals made from provocation of noise.
A juxtaposition of subcultures celebrated within one identity - Within the superfine tailoring of Harlem Dandies, Noh Theatre and Barbara Hulanickis’s Biba - erudite suiting spliced with memories of silhouettes - Edwardian childlike proportions and mid-century Teddy Boys. Narrow-shouldered coats cut with lapels wide and padded as vampiric gothic - tails undulating new-look volume, paired with zippered drain pipe trousers and thick soled creepers. A thrown-out rule book of Savile Row - arrived overprinted with a micro geometry of flocked op-art, part Warholian screen print, part symbolic Japanese tessellation - all somehow via Lagos. Expansive lapels appear padded as to protect - piratical and slashed as with the tip of Fontana's blade, as the layering of codes denoting far-reaching subcultures meld.

The presentation arrives without hesitation of conviction, and in so doing, is ceremonial in charge. An exacting sense, read from afar - where silhouettes are immediately identifiable as being the work of Kawakubo, sometimes brazenly so and yet, in contrast, the details, up close, delight with restraint, made with a level of care as to indicate a camaraderie of craftspeople. The contradiction of clashing energies of references, at times actively jar to inflict echoes of British punk and yet are underpinned with a tenderness of line which are graceful in poise, gestural in elegance, indicative of an emotive balance between being and becoming, mirrored in the model casting of late adolescence. The name Comme des Garçons feels ever prevalent when viewing the work, that ease and distance that certain boys have, unconscious of judgement, curious with their instinctive choices - forever youthful, forever within that space between.

A fascinating sense of positioning within time was actively engaged with, both historically within the visual references of specific silhouettes and fabrications, which act as a metaphor. Within a palpable sense of pulling and cutting from the very fibre of a time not yet experienced - an unfathomable uncertainty that belongs to the subconscious mystery of instinct. In the mystery of fear as provocation to identify, in the hope for another way and in another chance to live.

Comme Des Garçons Homme Plus, Spring Summer 2026.

COMME DES GARÇONS

Thank you Thomas Alsop.

113. ANTHONY CHO CHIT ON: A SPACE BETWEEN OUTSIDE AND INSIDE.

Anthony Chit On Cho, Hot Air 2, 17/06/2019, 20:08. Image published from a series within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

‘I recently encountered this word ‘anemoia’ which was coined by John Koenig to describe a sense of nostalgia for a time or experience one has never actually lived through. And I think through ‘activating’ these images I am trying to work through these digital memories and imagine alternative realties and speculative spaces for me to exist in.’ A.C.C.O.

The first time I saw your work, you experimented with scanning and printing images so that the effect was almost invisible, leaving a trace, a MA passing... I was amazed. How do you know when to take a picture?

This is a difficult question I feel because like many people I would say I take many different types of pictures. They serve different purposes for me but at the same time their functions don’t necessarily exist in isolation to each other, it’s murky…

The last photo I took on my phone was of some trees in Regent’s Park. I was actually trying to take a picture of a bird so I could look up what type of bird it was, but it flew away before I could manage so all you can see is a sea of green.

The photo before that was of a receipt so I could remember how much I needed to transfer my friend for my part of a meal.

And before that an empty can of Pepsi max on the sidewalk because it reminded me of someone.

But yeah, I think I know the type of picture you are referring to. Though I don’t think narrowing it down helps with the answer too much because even within this type of picture I think there are further sub-functions and motivations at play. However, I would say that I am taking them very instinctively, this kind of picture. Sometimes it’s a quick jolt you know, and I’ve taken out my phone without even realising. Other times it’s more of a slower realisation where I’ve walked past something in a hurry to get somewhere and am down the road when a thought pops up in my head that I am going to regret not taking a photo, so I walk all the way back even though I know it’s going to make me later than I already am.

Looking at some of the pictures I take I do see underlying threads. Aesthetically and in relation to atmosphere, I am often drawn to moments of stillness, reflections, light, things that make me feel warm, shadow, snow, rain, mist, glass, the ground, things that are out of focus and hidden… for me these almost have a shared tonality. The colours orange, grey and white come to mind for some reason.

Thematically, I would say that I am interested in things that seem out of place to me. Beautifully out of place. Humorously out of place. Strangely out of place. Things that ‘shouldn’t’ really be where they are. Odd colours. Odd shapes. Odd combinations. Odd coincidences. Odd parallels. Something about finding the unordinary in very ordinary moments appeals to me. I like to take images of things that I think are unnoticed by others. Things that cannot be captured again, in another time, at another place by another person.

And I think my urge to take a photo of something ultimately stems from a desperate attempt to try to hold on to that moment I have just witnessed. I think I need to take that picture because I don’t want to be the only one to have experienced that moment. Because there is a loneliness to that. Maybe I take photos to ease that loneliness. Almost to confirm that there are others that see what I see or at least have others have the opportunity to see what I saw.

Sorry I’m not sure I really answered the question. I think I’ve kind of gone around the edges of the question and talked about the why and the what so as to allude to the when.

When you sent me the pictures to choose for the new issue of M-A, you sent hundreds of images and in looking at them I thought how rooted in instinct your decision-making is - how as a whole the work felt that you were trying to understand something...

I resonate with that a lot. I definitely feel that one of the main reasons I take pictures is to understand what I am feeling and thinking at a specific time period because those are not always so obvious to me. And by observing what and why I am drawn to something I can better understand where I am at. Which will in turn inform the direction of a project or something. Kind of like a mind map. I use photography, specifically my phone, because it’s quick and easy, allowing me to be as intuitive as I can be. It’s almost like I’m engaging and collecting from an ‘outside’ to bring into an ‘inside’ where I can slow down and process the information I have accumulated. This is why I am not actually that bothered with getting the ‘perfect shot’ first time like maybe a photographer would do. I always take more images than I need to. The curation part of the process happens after taking the images if I do end up using them directly somehow in my work. I want to have as many options as possible to choose from and work with for when the ‘why’ is established.

I think it’s important to note how tied to a specific time these images are for me. Like how driven they actually are by what is on my mind within a loose time period despite me taking the shots instinctively. It’s often quite fun trying to identify the ‘seeds’ or triggers. For example, I recently took a picture of a map of the Northern Line- the ones you see at the bottom of the stairs before the platforms. It was actually two maps where a newer version was peeling away revealing an older map underneath. But it was slightly offset so you would have the same stations repeating creating this glitch effect. Roughly half an hour before that I was having a conversation about ‘palimpsests’ with some friends. For me, there is a relationship there. Though I can’t say for sure I wouldn’t have taken the picture if the conversation didn’t happen.

Yeah, but that tie to a specific time… it means that looking back at some of the images I sent, a lot of them don’t resonate with me the same way anymore. We are constantly changing of course. Though some persist. And perhaps, standing the test of time, these are the ones that really say something about me at my core…

Have you reached a point in your process where you can appreciate what the work as a whole tells you?

I don’t really see my works as wholes as such but as focused/saturated moments of something bigger. I merely function as a kind of mediator. The work and I just happen to share a set time together before it will inevitably embark on its own trajectory. This kind of relates to the fact that though I find what ‘my’ work tells me about myself and my relationship to the world useful, in a way I am much more interested in how other people perceive and engage with it and what I can learn from that.

A recent example of this that has stuck with me was when I was having a conversation with Prem Sahib about a work that I made where I essentially frame a kitchen towel. The idea first came about as I was painting where I noticed that the paper towel that I used to clean my brushes had these decorative swirls on them. And I found that as beautiful as whatever I was painting. I was interested in reversing the object of labour within the framed object, so I made the frame itself from scratch out of a really nice board of cherry. Framing something is a charged act- it suggests value, scarcity and a desire to preserve. I used a grey board for the mat, purely for aesthetic reasons. However, Prem pointed out that this further evoked the idea of scarcity because visually it alluded to the cardboard tube at the end of the roll… that single comment completely shifted how I understood the work.

Curation is something you have spoken of, your work focuses on atmosphere alot - what spaces draw you back?

Curation is definitely something I think a lot about. Again, I make lots of different types of works but I think in general I am trying to compose a tonality in my work that is concentrated but unstable. Like an atmosphere that is almost at the grasp (understood) but constantly escapes you. Unstable in the sense that there are multiple conflicting/non-sensical points of entry and spaces of occupation. Tonality is a word I resonate with a lot because though a lot of the times my work does not directly reference music, it is a space that inspires me a lot, methodologically and thematically.

Recently, I have also been exploring digital spaces. In the same way that I take photos, I have been doing these ‘digs’ using randomly generated prompts and taking screenshots intuitively on platforms like Reddit and YouTube. I have been compiling an archive of these images and trying to process them by transcribing them into paintings. I am not so interested in the paintings themselves but the very slow looking that the act of painting promotes. I am interested in the stories, narratives and parallels that I draw from these images through this slow looking and am currently working on ‘activating’ them into more sculptural/installation works.

I recently encountered this word ‘anemoia’ which was coined by John Koenig to describe a sense of nostalgia for a time or experience one has never actually lived through. And I think through ‘activating’ these images I am trying to work through these digital memories and imagine alternative realties and speculative spaces for me to exist in.

What are your signals for change?

We are constantly changing, whether we like it or not. For me, it’s important that my work reflects, respects, and accepts that. I try to maintain a willingness and openness to critically engage with myself and my practice.

Some of the signals that tell me it’s time to check in with myself are: familiarity, comfort, patterns—those moments when I begin to understand too much, when I think I know what I want to do next. When I’m no longer on the verge of drowning, but simply floating. That’s when I know something needs to shift.

Anthony Chit On Cho, Hot Air 1, 17/06/2019. Image published from a series within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

ANTHONY CHO CHIT ON

Anthony Cho Chit On is a contributing artist to Issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN), available from maaspacebetween.com along with 18 stockists including The Serpentine bookshop, Magculture Magalleria, Jeu de Paume and Dover Street Market.

A selection of new works by Anthony Cho Chit On is currently on public display as part of The Royal College of Art Summer Show, RCA Battersea campus, 1 Hester Road, London SW11 4AY. Until 22 June 12-6 PM.

112. JIAQI LIAO: A SPACE BETWEEN BODY AND CLAY.

The artist contemplates a personal process of expression…

Jiaqi Liao, ‘Scratching’, Foam clay, Mannequin. March 2024. Image courtesy of the artist.

‘I was obsessed with playing with clay impulsively long before I committed to it as a material. I knew I had a connection when I first touched it. Over time, it became a foreboding presence. Years later, when I studied this obsession more deeply, I began to understand how it intertwined with my exploration of the subconscious and unconscious. The material is incredibly honest.’ J.L.

1. The first time I saw your work, I think was a sculpture which involved feathers - there was a sense of dormancy, and also I was interested in the feeling of life and death - a particular feeling of physically being close to an object which felt incredibly exotic - physically exotic…

I appreciate the words you chose to describe the feeling, which genuinely resonate with my reflection. The feather sculpture, titled Eyes Closed, Wind Roaring Through the Body, reflects on the perspective of time being suspended: the sound in stillness, the tension within the softest state, the violence of the deepest openness in the heart... Yes, and the life and death. I think of the sky burial ceremony on the plateau of Tibet when I was creating the work. How does a state of life transition into another form of being, one with an enormous capacity for compassion?

On a more micro level, our thoughts, conscious ideas, and unconscious gestures go through life and death every minute and second. The purpose of making the sculpture was also an automatic gesture to suspend and materialise those fleeting sensual moments in the body. Fashion is about the body. But the body is not only about the exterior—what about the internal?

As we become secure enough to step into the unfamiliarity of the unconscious, we may reach those existences that dwell in our bodies but that we've never seen. Like an old man sitting there whom you've never met in real life, but he smiles at you and says, “I have waited for you for so long.”

Thank you for the words physically exotic. The sculpture explores unfamiliar mental territory.

2. The series of images in which liquids seem to be whipped to a state where they become near solid are fascinating…

Moist clay has such an intimate interaction with skin; it captures shapes and movements. How wonderful! And we can almost sense the memory of those moments just by seeing how the clay casts them. It is an accurate imprint of the fingers’ touch. The material becomes our teacher — we learn so much of the unknown from it. When I’m touching clay, I’m learning my own movements and gestures.

3. Your use of materials feels very connected to metaphor - is this intentional?

The body is very honest. I was obsessed with playing with clay impulsively long before I committed to it as a material. I knew I had a connection when I first touched it. Over time, it became a foreboding presence. Years later, when I studied this obsession more deeply, I began to understand how it intertwined with my exploration of the subconscious and unconscious. The material is incredibly honest.

So, I’d say it’s intentional — and also not. I didn’t deliberately seek a metaphor, but certain connections began to emerge naturally. The softness of feathers, the vulnerability of our subconscious, the rawness of clay, and the intimacy of leather… perhaps there are many more hidden connections in the things that move us.

4. The works using mannequins and the human body are very intriguing…

Mannequins have a special intimacy with every dressmaker—they are the canvas of a body. Glorious moments begin from them. I want to keep my sculpting gestures engaged with this preliminary state. The clumsiness and rawness of clay create a fascinating contrast on a polished mannequin. I set aside wearability for a while, allowing fleeting sensual experiences to happen on the exterior of the body.

On real flesh, it evokes even more conversation. Moist clay allows hands to leave fingerprints on the skin. The shape and texture of human skin shift—but that’s the natural cycle of the flesh. The narrative of clay exaggerates this for us to see. And again, it is the clay teaching us — reminding us of sensations we’ve begun to ignore.

5. What are your signals for change?

To feel is to change. Every moment that tickles is a signal for change. And so is everything that no longer does.

LEFT: Jiaqi Liao, ‘The Air Is Roaring’, terracotta clay, paper. July 2024. RIGHT: Anselm Kiefer, ‘Untitled’, 1974, Mixed Media on Paper. Courtesy of The Hall Collection. M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4: Signals, published June 2025. Still life image: Harry Nathan.

Jiaqi Liao is a contributing artist to Issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN), available from maaspacebetween.com along with 18 stockists including The Serpentine bookshop, Magculture Jeu de Paume, Magalleria and Dover Street Market.

JIAQI LIAO

With thanks to Zowie Broach and Royal College of Art Fashion MA programme.

111. HRAIR SARKISSIAN: A SPACE BETWEEN RESIDUE AND RESOURCE.

Finding My Blue Sky, Lisson Gallery - LONDON.

Hrair Sarkissian, Residue, 2019, Acylic. 193.5 × 113 × 6cm. Image by Junzhe Yang for M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

Hrair Sarkissian's 'Residue' stands as a roughly hewn plaque in what at first appears to be a piece of shrink-wrapped glass, its surface veined with a removable, protective cellophane - a surface, opalescent and shimmering in the sunlight. A surface surely protecting a precious ancient artefact, however, the work is fashioned from moulded acrylic and originates from 2019, momentarily fooling the viewer and provoking a fractured stream of consciousness to try to imagine what informed a work whose title suggests the remains of an event not in view but implied. 

To seemingly wrap a surface is not new within the history of art, an act utilised by Christo, whose wrapping of objects and architectural forms fetishises space. Further back, the swathes of cloth wrapping bodies became a mainstay for Renaissance portraiture, and yet Residue implies the shrink-wrapped surface of a form less bodily and more ready-made, found on the shelves of a supermarket - a runkled texture which immediately implies cosmetic consumer culture. Continuing an obsessive conversation which fascinated art from Andy Warhol's production line of screen prints, to Jeff Koons' impressions of inflatables to Sun Yitian's photorealist portraits of mannequins. 

Traces of previous periods can be sensed within Sarkissian's Residue, from the organic curvature of Art Nouveau and a minimalist Art Deco - the work depicts a naked young woman in profile, bobbed hair and choker jewellery link to 20th century Paris, and in turn relay back to reference of female slaves of the Ottoman seraglio era - a fashionable reference seen within European art in the 19th and 20th century. Famously referenced by René Lalique, whose interest in stylised mythological figures, hybridises art with design objects from perfume bottles to furniture. The influence of the subject's outstretched neck and pearlescent colour palette immediately connect to surrealist artists such as Dora Marr and Man Ray, who akin to Lalique, explored depictions of the body via ultra modern experimental means, embracing the developing technique of solarisation, a photographic treatment which reverses an image creating a halo-like effect, an effect which can result in both negative and positive qualities within the same image. 

It seems near impossible not to make a comparison to Man Ray’s infamous portrait of Lee Miller made in 1930, which supposedly ended the artists' collaborative and romantic relationship due to Ray's reaction to Miller's insistence that the ownership of the image be shared and not controlled by Ray. Man Ray's resistance and response resulted in a painting of a still life of objects, including a gloved hand holding a razor blade beneath Miller's slashed neck. Sarkissian's provoking work continues Miller's fractured argument of ownership and positioning. 

Akin to Ron Mueck's 'En Garde', a seven-foot-high installation of a pack of dogs intimidating and snarling, the audience knows that they are not real, however, the work performs a physical metaphor to consider and witness. 

Could we also view Residue as a three-dimensional conversation prompt?- historically referred to as 'object dialogue', a work created for contemplating an unresolved series of questions, through discussion and interpretation. A provocative presence, more a residual comment on what is left in front, not what is left behind? 

The works form a returning echo to that of Masaomi Yasunaga, also presented at Lisson Gallery, back in 2023. The Japanese artist's work appears as fragmented archaeological artefacts, seemingly ancient and yet made within the modern era. When viewed from a distance, Yasunaga's trove of vessels impresses and remind of characterful silhouettes which mimic the prowess of their original reference and yet through the artists hands, these ceramic-less vessels held together with stones, mosaic tiles and glaze alone testify to the fragility of time - a sense of the ancient and the impending all at once.

Sarkissian continues this visual conversation, the works irregular silhouette appears to be gouged, even chipped away from a previous surface, memories informed by the plinths on display within the collection of The British Museum or The Louvre - decorative works of plaster or stone historically extracted from their country of origin - permanently defacing the original site specific original, creating a fractured reframing - a boarder where an image becomes viewed out of context from its original purpose. For example, a frieze, now viewed as a singular section, often from sacred sites, as tombs and religious spaces. Physically heavy, now metaphorically weighted with further meaning of possible imminent replacement...As global conversations continue to increase to return these elements to their original locations, whereby these jig-saw like pieces would fit back within the spaces from which they were originally taken, forever to be scarred with the trauma lines of extraction. 

Sarkissian's Residue further explores this notion, the hacked portrait of an unknown subject appears severed, provoking the viewer to wonder what the rest of the freeze may have looked like, why is the subject turned in profile? Presented not fixed to a wall, but viewed on a plinth and so offering the onlooker multiple angles to choose from, further contributing to a perplexing sense of benign confusion. 

By proposing a work which is in a permanent state of being wrapped - fascinates - prompting an idea of a continuing state of potential and in so doing changes the sense of ownership. From the vacuum-packed product whose airtight wrapper normally denotes timescale with best-before-date on organic products... Sarkissian's Residue implies a new status, a new state of optimism, that box fresh equates to resale potential, just be careful not to break the surface. 

“I try to engage the viewer into a more profound reading of what lies behind the surface, thereby re-evaluating larger historical or social narratives.” Hrair Sarkissian.

Hrair Sarkissian, Residue, 2019, Acylic. 193.5 × 113 × 6cm. Image by Junzhe Yang for M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

Hrair Sarkissian Lisson Gallery, Finding My Blue Sky, Curated by Dr. Omar Kholeif, 67 Lisson Street, Until 26 July 2025.

Photographed by Junzhe Yang.

With thanks to Louise Hayward and Lisson Gallery, London.

110: TEGA AKPOKONA: A SPACE BETWEEN DETERMINATION AND SPONTANEITY.​

​As with his paintings, where brushwork breaks through layers of detail caught between states, so too does an artist in motion, discovering and witnessing their own signals of change. Tega Akpokona contemplates the evolution of his own voice. 

Tega Akpokona, ‘Maquette sketch and shadow installation 2, paper and tape binders,2024. Image courtesy of the artist.

‘I’m convinced that language itself is born from a peculiar human need to understand, and to be thoroughly understood…

…I was using my work as a unit for understanding the language of ‘masses’ and the concept of “mass character” - an observed phenomenon within African people that dictates a predisposition to spontaneously respond in mass mobilization; where the mass identity takes prominence over individual determination.’ T.A.

The first time I saw and was aware of your work, I think was seeing some studies for paintings that you had made on tiles and I was immediately captivated - and then I remember seeing your maquettes via zoom for figurative paintings - again I felt that this was a new language…

I remember quite well the genuineness that I could sense from your non-verbal response and the simplicity in the depth of your feedback as being an important marker for me, especially at the early stage of the programme, unpacking new information and concepts to develop a better understanding of my work. At the time I was using my work as a unit for understanding the language of ‘masses’ and the concept of “mass character”- an observed phenomenon within African people that dictates a predisposition to spontaneously respond in mass mobilization; where the mass identity takes prominence over individual determination.

I drew references from archives of historical and contemporary political happenings where this peculiar character has been exhibited, highlighting the recent series of political protests and riots that happened in Lagos, which spread across Nigeria in a ripple effect. I wanted my work to provide the audience with a sense of being led by hand through the chaos, and to engage empathetically with the subject matter. To effectively achieve this I felt the urge to explore the potential for painting in an expanded context and present a more immersive experience. It was while engaging in a task of experimenting and quick making with sketch models using discarded material and paper that the ideas emerged to restage scenes of the riots and candle light processions on a more intimate scale. This new direction would provide a fresh lens for me to view my prospective painting compositions from new dimensions. I’m convinced that language itself is born from a peculiar human need to understand, and to be thoroughly understood.

Tega Akpokona, ‘Study (in reverence for life)’, Ink and gouache on paper. 2024. Adjacent page: Alma Stritt, ‘haven’t been home for a while.’ 05.05.24. M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) issue 4, published May 2025. Still Life image: Harry Nathan.

Within the new M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) there are three artists who are depicting Lagos, Joy Julius, Daniel Obasi and yourself, all in very different ways and yet there is a physicality in the use of movement which is shared. Can you contemplate why you wanted to depict movement within your work?

An interesting aspect of living and making art in Lagos (one of the most densely populated and socially vibrant coastal cities on the continent) for me is that I subconsciously develop a peculiar adjustability to the constant movement (physically and metaphorically), while navigating societal factors that restrict movement. The feeling of tension and sense of urgency is near palpable, and this inevitably informs the decision-making process and conceptual framework of my work, especially when I depict socio-political themes. I understand from an African frame of reference that momentum and rhythm is an essential universal language, so when I make work, I’m conscious that the audience are innately drawn to interpreting the language of movement, just as importantly as finding resonance with the subject matter of the work. This priority for depicting movement and the ephemeral nature of time has informed the way I have developed my visual language and how I engage with materiality - from the use of gestural brushwork and directional mark making with the intent of guiding the eyes through the topography of the surface, to experimenting with painting on floor tiles (that I sourced from waste residues from building sites around the city, in response to the drastic move to modernize the city of Lagos). Developing a visual language to interpret and find resolve to the subject of movement is an essential part of my practice.

I remember a brief conversation we shared regarding the etchings of Goya, Which artists fascinate you?

Yes I recall comparing the honesty in storytelling and the absence of care for consequence in Goya’s later work as likened to a ‘confession from a dying witness’. His incredibly delicate technique and the level of dedication to truth and the depth to which he was willing to reveal his vision will always make Goya a revered reference point for artists working today in a time of intense systemic censorship. I’m reassured by the timeless impact of Goya’s oeuvre that the relentless pursuit of truth is the ultimate purpose and contribution of the artist. I’m inspired by Goya’s dedication to drawing. In the same light, Kathe Kollwitz is an artist whose work I hold in high reverence for mastery of technique; I’m fascinated by her ability to convey the tenderness of human emotions using lines. I’m particularly drawn to and fascinated by artists who found a way to develop a mastery of their technique that precisely communicates their vision of the world as they have experienced it, especially amidst turbulent times.

I think of your use of ochre, can you contemplate why you return to yellow within your painting?

On first contemplation, I can identify that spending my formative years within the tropical parts of Nigeria played a significant role in shaping my perception and appreciation for earth tones. The consistency of an all-year summer climate illuminating the hue of the natural environment certainly heightened my capacity to perceive warmth. A distinct and prominent feature of the sub-Saharan environment is the abundance of sandy soil, with its nuances of ochre tones. My interaction with this natural material would represent my earliest and essential imprint in the process of developing a relationship with colour and an organic bias for a colour range as I grew familiar with paint pigment. I’m also greatly inspired by the significance of ochre-based pigments in the history of painting and image making. From the way it was transformed in Egyptian iconography to depict the radiance of the skin, to its essential feature in the iconic works of master artists like Rembrandt. For me the use of ochre represents a very primal and familiar sombre visual language for telling human stories that resonates on an intrinsic level.

You are due to continue your studies in London later this year. What attracts you to this city?

The city of London has always been of fascination for me because of its unique significance to art history, vast museum infrastructure and a delicately balanced confluence of cultures. I feel instinctively optimistic about my upcoming learning experience alongside an inexhaustible array of talented individuals. I’m keen to engage my sensitivity to movement with the environment and community.

What are your signals for change?

The feeling of unease and dissatisfaction with the status quo is an ultimate signal for change, and I believe that identifying and responding to the urgency of these signs can serve as a dependable compass for the creative working today.

Tega Akpokona, Reverence, 2024, Oil on canvas, 70 1/10 × 59 4/5 in. Image via MATT gallery, Paris.

Tega Akpokona is a contributing artist to Issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN), available from maaspacebetween.com along with 18 stockists including The Serpentine bookshop, Magalleria, Jeu de Paume and Dover Street Market.

TEGA AKPOKONA

109. SUN YITIAN: A SPACE BETWEEN TRANSCIENCE AND TIMELESSNESS.

The depictions of objects within Sun Yitian’s paintings are not as they first appear… Placid figurines stare glacially while inflatables, taught to bursting, gently float within images saturated with a palette familiar from pop art - and yet digital bright with an exhausted melancholy of knowing, replacing any trace of innocence - If only these paintings could speak… The artist discusses personal influences and cultural significance. 

Abridged Interview

Sun Yitian, Castle, 67 x 67 cm, Acrylic on canvas 2023.
Courtesy of Sun Yitian's Studio, BANK/MABSOCIETY and ESTHER SCHIPPER, Berlin/Paris/Seoul.

‘In the classical era, the life span of an object was longer than that of a human being, but in the modern era, the life span of an object is becoming shorter and shorter. I am fond of these fleeting objects produced on the assembly line, which were my childhood playmates and the imprint of my generation.’ S.Y.

There are many depictions of dolls within your work, why are you drawn back to this context?

您的作品中有许多关于玩偶的描绘，为什么您会被这种背景所吸引？

我出生在90年代的中国，那时候我们实行的是计划生育的政策，因此我的同代人大部分都是独生子女，家里并没有其他的兄弟姐妹可以一起玩耍。而90年代的中国也因为改革开放政策经济在不断地腾飞。我的家乡温州就是一个以制造业而闻名的城市。因此，我小时候经常会去朋友家里的工厂里面玩，而工厂里的流水线上有很多外地来的工人，他们没日没夜地干着活，工厂的陈列室里摆满了流水线上生产出来的玩具，眼镜，打火机，他们远销世界各地。作为独生子女，我经常一个人在家里和玩偶一起度过了很多父母不在家的时光。上大学的时候，机缘巧合地去了一次义乌，我惊讶于那些林林总总，充满时代感的造型、材质、配色和触感的小商品，便开始了我的“人造物”系列创作。古典时代，物的寿命比人要长，而进入现代，物的生命愈发短暂。我留恋这些流水线上生产出来的稍纵即逝的物品，它们是我童年的玩伴，也是这个时代的印记。

I was born in China in the 1990s, when during the nation’s family planning policy, so most of my generation were only children, without siblings to play with. In the 1990s, China's economy was taking off because of the reform and opening-up policy. My hometown, Wenzhou, is a city known for its manufacturing industry. Therefore, in my childhood, I would often play with my friend in her family's factory, and there were a lot of workers from out of town on the assembly line in the factory, who worked day and night. I used to see in the factory showroom many small goods produced on assembly lines, such as toys, glasses, lighters, which were later exported all over the world. As an only child, I spent a lot of time alone with dolls when my parents were not at home. When I was in college, I went to Yiwu by chance and was amazed by the variety of shapes, materials, colors, and tactile sensations of those small commodities, and then I began my series of creations of man-made objects. In the classical era, the life span of an object was longer than that of a human being, but in the modern era, the life span of an object is becoming shorter and shorter. I am fond of these fleeting objects produced on the assembly line, which were my childhood playmates and the imprint of my generation.

Your work has an extraordinary quality of immediate realism, which almost appears to be digital and yet these works are the opposite, they are painted by hand - this contradiction is fascinating, what do you feel the methods of your process contextually imply?

您的作品具有一种非凡的直接写实主义特质，几乎可以说是数字化的，然而这些作品却恰恰相反，它们是手工绘制的--这种矛盾令人着迷，您觉得您的创作方法在语境中意味着什么？

由于显示频幕的尺寸和显示效果，我的画在手机里看是像照片一样的写实，并且数字感很强。但是看我作品的实物，其实是存留了很多绘画的痕迹的，肌理，笔触，颜色的堆叠，我会把绘画的路径留一个小口给观众窥探。我希望用一种古典的方式去塑造一种当代的图像，而并不是用一种波普的方式去再现当下的图景。就像我更热衷于17世纪荷兰的静物画，在意画面的结构，颜色，以及物的隐喻。

Due to the size of the screen and the display effect, my paintings look like photo realistic in the phone and have a strong sense of digital effect. But when you look at my works in person, there are actually many traces of painting, texture, brush strokes, colo​ur stacking, and I always leave a small window of the painting process for the viewer to peek into. My aim is to shape a contemporary image in a classical way, rather than reproducing the current image in a pop way. Just as I am more passionate about 17th century Dutch still life paintings, I care about the structure of the image, the colors, and the metaphors of the objects.

I find the emotion of your work to be fascinating, the high-octane palette and the lustrous surfaces and yet there seems to be so much melancholy - do you feel this? And if so can you express how you define emotion within your work?

我发现你作品中的情感非常迷人，高调的色调和光亮的表面，但似乎又有很多忧郁--你有这种感觉吗？ 如果是这样，您能表达一下您是如何在作品中定义情感的吗？

早期创作，我需要绝对的客观，我不希望带入任何个人的情感和叙事，这才能保持一种真正中立的状态。我其实希望将观看绘画的干扰因素都去除掉，只剩下一个非常冷静客观、甚至显得“沉默”的画面。
 
在去年巴黎的个展里，我突然对画面中的叙事性感兴趣，于是我在展览里用好几组画来串联起叙事线索。也就是说，我不希望叙事性在我单张的绘画中过多地呈现，因为有了叙事就很难避免情感的外露。如何在绘画中有节制地表达，是我目前阶段感兴趣的话题。

In my early works, absolute objectivity was a must; I didn't want to bring in any personal emotions or narratives in order to maintain a truly neutral expression. In fact, I wanted to exclude all distractions from viewing the painting and maintain a very calm, objective, even "silent" image.
 
In my solo exhibition in Paris last year, I showed my interest in narrative in painting in recent years. I used several groups of paintings in the exhibition to connect the narrative threads. In other words, I don't want to present too much narrative in a single painting, because with narrative it is difficult to avoid the exposure of emotion. How to express emotions in paintings in a restrained way is a topic I am interested in at this stage.

The act of painting, historically and still today seems to imply permanence, and yet your subject matter seems to return to references of the ephemeral, this contradiction is fascinating...

绘画行为，无论是在历史上还是在今天，似乎都意味着永恒，而你的主题似乎又回到了短暂的参照物上，这种矛盾令人着迷......

在古典时代，人在自然中降生与成长，而时至今日，我们在人造物的包围中醒来。物（Object）的扩张和膨胀让物的寿命变得愈发短暂，物总是处在一种不断升级/更新换代中。这是自18-19世纪初工业革命以来，生产力不断提高所带来的物的过剩。它是一种无法避免的趋势。而往往短暂的事物才令人着迷。用绘画的永恒去抵抗物的短暂。

Whereas in classical times people were born and raised in nature, today we wake up surrounded by artefacts. The expansion of objects has shortened their lifespan, and they are constantly being upgraded and renewed. This is the surplus of objects brought about by the increasing productivity since the Industrial Revolution of the 18th and early 19th centuries. It is an inevitable trend. The transience of things is fascinating. What fascinates me is the resistance of the transience of things with the timelessness of painting.

The full interview with Sun Yitian is published within issue 4 of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN).

Sun Yitian, A Tender Panther, Cropped - cover of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) Issue 4. Still life image: Harry Nathan.

Orignial work: 150 cm × 150 cm, Acrylic on canvas 2017. Courtesy of Sun Yitian's Studio, BANK/MABSOCIETY and ESTHER SCHIPPER, Berlin/Paris/Seoul.

Sun Yitian’s ‘Tender Panther’ on the cover of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) Issue 4 - sold at Dover Street Market, Haymarket London, 15 May 2025.

Sun Yitian is a contributing artist to the 4th issue of M-A (A SPACE BETWEEN) available now.

Sun Yitian, Romantic Room - Ester Schipper, Berlin. Until 31 May, 2025.

Thank you Haihai at studio Sun Yitian, Ester Schipper and Zhonghua Sui.