Young creators reclaim human connection

Rather than reconstructing a linear historical narrative, the work follows the traces, gaps and contradictions that persist across archives, landscapes and memory, revealing how war, colonialism and forced displacement continue to shape contemporary space and practices of remembrance.

"Sailor" Song Qingyu's mixed-media work, The Investiture of the Bee Gods, explores how "divinity" has been manifested throughout civilization. Fundamentally, the manifestations have always been interwoven with two fundamental forms: the products of mysterious nature and the products of human civilization. Centered on bees, Song's work examines how these two basic forms emerge, interact, and transform across different cultures.

Ancient Greek priestesses of Artemis were known as Melissai, meaning honeybees. Song first revisited the Temple of Artemis ruins in the ancient city of Ephesus, Turkiye, through 3D scanning and ecological fieldwork, documenting how nature reclaimed the ruins of civilization.

She then visited a "sacred bee tree" in Yunnan province, venerated for generations by a local ethnic community. There, the tree and bees form a symbiotic ecological sanctuary, displaying a natural divinity that arises directly from life itself.

Using scanned data collected along the journey, the artist re-created temple fragments in beeswax, which served as frameworks for bee colonies to build their hives. The bees then covered and reshaped the human designs with their wax, transforming static symbols into dynamic, living entities. In this work, the remnants of civilization coexist with nature, together illustrating the fluidity of the divine.

The Unnamed Warp and Weft, co-created by Yang Xin and Yang Yingmei, grew out of long-term field research of women's drawn-work labor history in Chaoshan, Guangdong province.

Developed through intergenerational collaboration, the project invites women skilled in drawn-work embroidery to translate their oral histories into hollowed-out Chinese text. Using the traditional technique of "white thread on white fabric", they re-inscribe women's labor experiences that have long been hidden within the histories of global trade.

The six hanging white draperies were meticulously stitched, thread by thread, by illiterate drawn-work artisans, transforming a craft once dedicated to export production into a readable historical text. A video of the same title captures the women as they stitch, decipher, and narrate the stories embedded in the fabric.

In an era dominated by AI, projects that document local customs, traditional crafts, and individuals'or communities' historical truths are particularly significant in "helping us maintain a more genuine connection to the world", Xu says.

"The constant barrage of false or reassembled experiences can harm our perception, mind and feelings. Because we live in a time where our ability to feel is at risk of being lost, these very specific personal experiences can awaken our senses," he adds.

Technology offers a view of the vast world, like a kaleidoscope, with everything rushing at people as soon as they open their phones. But in reality, he notes, every experience is highly simplified.

He warns that when people are constantly immersed in these simplified experiences, their understanding of themselves, others, and the world becomes simplified as well, reducing the complexity and sensitivity of human beings.

"Excessive simplification leads to dehumanization. Our humanity is diminished, and we cease to exist as complex individuals. A simplified society makes us monotonous. It makes our perception and existence more abstract," he observes.

Xu uses internet violence as an example.

"Why is online language so violent? Because we simplify each other. If we were vibrant and whole individuals facing each other, many of these words would be unspeakable. Once people are simplified, anything can happen. Many conflicts in the human world arise from efforts to simplify and label others. Only by de-complexifying others can you easily treat them thoughtlessly. Simplification reduces human empathy and understanding," he says.

"Resisting this abstraction is very important. The simple, personal experiences in the exhibition can help preserve our innocence, which is very important for us as humans — innocence and warmth," he stresses.

When asked whether the program will accept works assisted by AI, Xu says, "We cannot reject new technologies.

"However, new technologies must be closely related to our real and specific personal experiences. They should extend our humanity, not replace it," he notes.