This catalogue accompanies Ikon’s exhibition (6 July – 11 September 2016) by renowned Chinese artist Kan Xuan. The exhibition presents a wide selection of video pieces made since the late 1990s.

Refreshingly unpretentious and economical in style, with familiar subject matter, they are profoundly philosophical about the nature of human life.

‘Kan Xuan’s work is often based on personal experience, and she herself sometimes features, as in the early video Kanxuan! Ai! (1999) in which she is seen dashing through subway tunnels shouting her own name, as if searching for herself, and answering in the affirmative, “Ai!”. She is moving against a tide of heaving humanity, at once anxious, funny, romantic, whilst making a clear political statement, representing the plight of an individual in the face of a totalitarian mass.’ (Ikon Gallery website).

The catalogue is fully illustrated and includes a comprehensive essay by Shanghai based writer Lu Leiping.

English and Chinese text.