Lin Yan, Mizar, 2017-2025. Paper, ink & wires, 225x310x220cm.
Lin Yan: Everlasting Layers, a landmark exhibition by the internationally acclaimed Chinese artist is on view at Alisan Atelier in Hong Kong, as a centerpiece of the French May Arts Festival 2025. Spanning two decades of Lin Yan's career, the exhibition traces her evolution from early 2000s experiments to site-specific installations as recent as this year, redefining the poetic potential of paper through the melding of Chinese tradition and global contemporary practice. Born in Beijing into a storied artistic lineage (her grandfather was modernist pioneer Pang Xunqin; her mother, abstract painter Pang Tao), Lin Yan's practice is rooted in the rich heritage of Chinese ink on paper yet enriched by her global journey.
Lin Yan, Hutong #3, 2013. Chinese ink on xuan paper, iron wire, 34x30x29cm.
After formative studies at L'École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Lin spent over two decades in New York, where she exhibited widely and refined her cross-cultural vision. This trilateral influence—Beijing's legacy, Parisian formal rigour, and New York's avant-garde energy—fuels her transformation of Xuan paper into intricate and impactful installations. Layering pleated sheets, ink, plaster, and urban detritus, Lin conjures meditations on memory, decay, and renewal. Her work, as noted in a 2023 CAFA (Central Academy of Fine Arts, Bejing) Art Museum retrospective, "transcends geography, turning fragile material into a universal language of impermanence."
Lin Yan, Summer #3, 2023. Chinese ink on hand made paper on wood board, 50x40x8cm.
Curated as a career survey, Everlasting Layers unveils Lin Yan's pioneering dialogue with paper. Responding to the demolition of Beijing's historic buildings after her return in 1994, Lin began casting surfaces of old architecture in Xuan paper, preserving vanishing elements like roof tiles and rivets. Originally trained as an oil painter, she shifted to Xuan paper as her primary medium by 2005, creating sculptural works that meditate on tranquility through soft, crumbled layers. Her practice negotiates contrasts—black ink and white paper, hard and soft textures, darkness and light—as seen in early pieces such as those from her 2008 solo exhibition at China Square New York, Remaking. Since the 2010s, Lin has expanded into site-specific installations, responding to architectural spaces with works like Embracing Stillness (2013) at New York's Flatiron Prow Art Space, Sky (2014) at Beijing's Yuan Art Museum, Beyond Xuan Paper (2014) at Brussels' The Associazione Culturale Officina and Sky 2 (2017) at Sydney's White Rabbit Gallery. Through layered imagery and lyrical forms, her works invite viewers to contemplate ecological impermanence and inner tranquility—a meditation on humanity's fragile yet enduring bond with the natural world.
Lin Yan, Crossing #2, 2025. Paper, Chinese ink, silk & cotton thread on canvas, 116x89cm, 120x91x8cm (incl frame).
For this exhibition, Lin Yan has conceived immersive installations that interact dynamically with Alisan Atelier's architecture and surroundings. Suspended paper sculptures, some stained with ink or entangled with cotton threads, evoke ancient scrolls reimagined for the Anthropocene. Her site-specific installations, spanning cities worldwide, confront global warming and environmental fragility while evoking the interconnectedness of nature, humanity, and the cosmos. By embedding fragments of urban rubble or casting shadows through crumpled layers, Lin invites viewers to contemplate transience and renewal. "Lin's work is a conversation between material and void," notes Daphne King, Global Director of Alisan Fine Arts. "She transforms Xuan paper—a symbol of China's artistic heritage—into a living medium that breathes with the space it inhabits."
Lin Yan, Re-encounter, 2025. Xuan paper, silk & charcoal on canvas, 116x90cm, 120x91x22cm (incl frame).
About the Exhibition
Dates: 6 May–16 August 2025
Venue: Alisan Atelier
Courtesy of the Artist and Alisan Fine Arts.
