Between Trace and Signal — Group Exhibition
Between Trace and Signal — Group Exhibition
Duration: January 1–February 28, 2026
Artist: Friedrich Andreoni, Chuanduan Chen, Tingwei Li, Anna Lucia, Norman Maýn, Ivona Tau, Yiy Zhang
Curator: Dr. Jasmin Gong
Gallery: Art On Space x Galerie Met x InterCulture
Venue: Sensing Bookstore, Foshan, China
Prologue
Art On Space, Galerie Met, and InterCulture are pleased to present the group exhibition Between Trace and Signal in Foshan. The exhibition centres on the dialogue between material and information, handcraft and technology, drawing on Jacques Derrida’s concept of the “trace.” Neither fully present nor entirely absent, the trace marks the deferral of meaning as it unfolds through processes of translation. The works of seven artists examine how meaning is generated through historical translation, the encoding of memory, and the suspension of form.
Friedrich Andreoni’s ‘Untitled' series investigates the formal transformation of cultural symbols. The curved dagger of the Arabian Peninsula—rooted in the artist’s childhood environment and bearing both functional and symbolic significance—serves as a recurring motif. In the triptych cast-aluminium works, the materiality of metal places the blade’s internal geometric tension in a state of suspension, revealing latent potential. In the epoxy resin versions, variations in the density of Arabian blue pigment materialise the shifting chromatic memory of the Arabian Sea. In another group of works bearing the same title, a row of cast automotive shark-fin antennas is inverted and mounted on the wall. Through spatial reconfiguration, these industrial objects become symbols of “rewinding” within analog and digital media, suggesting a reconsideration of linear time and historical narrative.
Chen Chuanduan’s ‘The Belly of the Great Serpent: Prophecy’ constructs a virtual archive surrounding the fictional entity “Nogulis.” Meteors, scales, and other materials are translated into a narrative structured around themes of “shelter” and “redemption.” The pre-meal prayer, “The world is in the belly of the great serpent,” promises warmth and protection while simultaneously revealing enclosure and consumption. This allegory exposes how memory can be reconstructed into a state that is both seductive and dangerous, pointing to conditions in which the subject, promised safety within a system, is gradually “digested” by it.
Tingwei Li’s video work ‘Exit’ appropriates the screen saver—an everyday digital format of the contemporary era. Five cage-like structures that defy the rules of perspective rotate along equidistant tracks, appearing and disappearing. These impossible forms exist only within two-dimensional projection, where the looping mechanism of the screen saver transforms time from linear progression into a closed circuit. The rhythms of arrival, dwelling, and departure are fixed through perpetual repetition, metaphorically articulating the tension between structural constraint and mobility.
In ‘Oefenstof’, Anna Lucia treats textile samples as a language system that can be rewritten through computational logic. Drawing from classical textile patterns, she intervenes and reconstructs them using custom algorithms. While the final material form is machine-woven, the algorithm itself embodies a form of intellectual handcraft. This non-AI algorithmic trace functions as an intermediary—both an homage to the history of craftsmanship and a critical reconsideration of craft, authorship, and labor value in an era of human–machine collaboration.
Norman Maýn constructs visual landscapes of displacement and absence. In his works, nature and architecture are not romanticized objects but spatiotemporal markers that carry memory and desire. Recurrent yet unentered houses become visual forms of distance. Operating as silent signifiers, these images point to an unbridgeable gap between lived experience and residual memory.
Departing from dominant technological paradigms that quantify or optimize the body, Ivona Tau’s AI-generated photographic works extract the human figure from conventional modes of representation, exploring it instead as a dynamic “system.” Drawing on the formal clarity of Rodin and the rigorous aesthetics of Mapplethorpe, Tau treats the body as an organic material that is both sensual and structured. By guiding AI models through specific functions, she navigates unstable zones of conceptual ambiguity, rejecting predetermined aesthetic outcomes. The resulting forms reveal the body as an intermediary field between physical limitation and digital abstraction.
Yiy Zhang’s ‘Mindfulness’ originates from the artist’s observation of prayer gestures in temples: hands pressed together, palms slightly hollowed. Inviting worshippers to participate, the artist places clay between their palms during prayer, allowing pressure to shape the material according to the negative space formed by the hands. After firing, the white ceramic objects preserve the unique imprints and curves of each participant’s hands, transforming a fleeting ritual act into a tangible volume. Through serial display, the work reveals subtle relationships between individual states, collective ritual, and the external world.
From cultural symbols to craft traditions, from bodily memory to social structures, the practices presented in Between Trace and Signal do not seek to fix meaning, but to foreground processes of translation. Meaning here remains perpetually in formation.