Zhang Ruyi

Hu Shi Guang Art Eco Site: Located in Longyou, Zhejiang Province, the Art Eco-Site is committed to continuing to expand the power of youth in a deeper direction, building, enriching, and sharing with the local villages. The local art unit uses content to deeply link coastal villages, allowing art to penetrate inward and villagers to perceive outward. The local cultural space makes use of the unused old houses to meet the supporting functions and tells the local stories through research and curation.

UAP was fortunate to have been invited by the artist and Hu Shi Guang Art Eco Site to provide the artist with inspiration for her creation. The project attempts to revitalise the broken walls of the old run down residential site in an artistic way. Using the old house as a base structure, the work "grows" with the help of weeds and moss crawling all over the walls. This creates a metallic, twisted plant form with a slightly dull shimmering light. The original form of the plant is taken from a collection of failed cultured plants that the artist has kept over the years. In the humid urban environment, this plant, which usually lives in the dry desert, shows a special aesthetic of wilting and shrivelling due to environmental changes.

Throughout the production process, it was essential to transform a wilted, slender cactus into a data model and recover its countless small and complex morphological textures. To fit the creative vision, the UAP team and the artist made many attempts and finally presented this incredible work.