Part of the generation that grew up with the internet, Chinese contemporary artist Rao Weiyi explores the aesthetics of the digital realm, juxtaposing its innate immateriality with the physicality of painting.
Read MoreRao's paintings capture ambiguous references to technology, duplicating or extending familiar digital imagery into the physical realm. This divorcing of the digital from its original context generates a vague sense of dissonance, with the fluid visual language we are accustomed to seeing on a screen emerging statically on canvas.
Drawing from the vernacular of the internet, metaverse, or animation, Rao hybridises these referents in paintings characterised by their bright, acidic colours, optical effects, and fractured compositions.
For the group exhibition I-DeFine (2020) at A Thousand Plateaus Art Space in Chengdu, Rao presented Record (2020), a small-scale square painting featuring a blurred image of a passionately kissing couple, their arms wrapped around each other, and their forms stark against the bright, mottled green background—perhaps a digital render of grass.
Superimposed on the couple is the fractured outline of a third figure in what appears to be characters or strings of code. The figure appears to be holding up a camera, poised to take a photograph. Ambiguous in its meaning, Record may allude to the ritualised quality of digital culture, or the performative, traceable nature of online behaviour.
For his inaugural solo exhibition, We wander, in separate worlds (2022) at A Thousand Plateaus Art Space, Rao presented an expansive new series of paintings executed in a wide variety of styles. Works such as Aurora (2022), Doublemint (2022), and Swallow (2022) have an airbrushed appearance, with fluorescent tones seamlessly blended in seductive gradients, giving the illusion of being a digitally rendered or manipulated image—the incorporation of sand, however, anchors the works with a textural, tactile presence.
Other paintings collage disparate visual references—the translucent acrylic on georgette painting New Way (2021) presents a blurred seated figure on a laptop, surrounded by floating motifs including eyes, stars, and a crawling baby, also with a laptop. Water Army (2022) features rows of silhouettes of soldiers and ships in lime green, contrasted against an unidentifiable background image reminiscent of digital noise or pixelation. Digital Literati (2021) comprises multiple layers of blended pastel tones, floating masks, and an ambiguous pale grey sketch.
The exhibition's title alludes to the separate worlds inhabited by individuals on the internet. Seen together, Rao's paintings might offer glimpses of idiosyncratic corners of these worlds, and subvert the allure of transmissible information, high-definition, or beauty.
Rao Weiyi has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in China.
Solo exhibitions include We wander, in separate worlds, A Thousand Plateaus Art Space, Chengdu (2022).
Group exhibitions include I-DeFine, A Thousand Plateaus Art Space, Chengdu (2020).
Rao Weiyi's works have been presented in fairs including ART021 Shanghai Contemporary Art Fair (2021), Art Shenzhen (2021), and Guangzhou Contemporary Art Fair (2020).
Misong Kim | Ocula | 2022
