Art Within Reach

Artist / Ren Lingfei

Lingfei Ren is a visual artist, curator and producer based in New York City, US. She received her MFA in Photography, Video and Related Media at the School of Visual Arts, New York City, her BA in Fine Arts at Southeast University, Nanjing, and an MA in Arts Management at George Mason University, Washington DC. Her art practices discuss the definition of 'home' and people’s psychological conditions affected by identity, family, social construction, and urban life.

Ren Lingfei's works reveal the author's response to family affection, love, changes in social environment and the process of world history in a straightforward or metaphorical way, so as to explore the impact of identity, family, society and urban life on people's psychological state.

Looking back from the moment, since the outbreak, most people's lives have experienced a severe seperation. People's attitude towards life and their understanding of the world have completely changed. In Isolation, i.e. Fragment 1-15, Ren Lingfei reflects her emotional projection of life - loneliness, depression, disappointment, anxiety and loss by cutting, adhering and overlapping the images. This sense of isolation comes not only from the destruction of the original life by home isolation, but also from the powerlessness and uneasiness of individuals in the face of great uncertainty. At the same time, the work also discusses the illusion of two-dimensional space image to the simulation of three-dimensional world.

After the outbreak, people seem to be used to moving all kinds of social online to help us communicate with the world virtually through the screen. In Picnic on the grass, the people in the work are in the same time and space. However, the images of each person's face, hands, and objects close to them, which are essential for real interaction, are replaced by mirrors. Then it was shown in Picnic on zoom — these fragmented and self-contained plane spaces reflect the metaphor of online video communication we are experiencing every day.

During the outbreak, home has become the space where people spend the longest time. Rooms consists of photo sculptures — multi-layered sheets of acrylic with photographic collages on them — that depict rooms in residential rental buildings in New York City.

The project investigates the economics and architectures of rental apartment, and reflects upon the housing dilemmas of recent transplants to the metropolis: the nomadic lifestyle with frequent relocations and temporality of "home." Confined within a room as their only private space, residents utilize every square inch to bring out the most functionality, identity, and diversity.

Exhibitions

Ren Lingfei's works were exhibited internationally, including International Center of Photography, New York City, Three Shadows Photography Art Center, Xiamen, Filter Space, Chicago, Being 3 Gallery, Beijing, Yue Art Museum, Beijing, Chengdu Art Museum, Chengdu, Allab Art Center, Chengdu, Photography Museum of Lishui, Lishui, La Mama La Galleria, New York City, Photo Fringe, Brighton, UK, Quad, Derby, UK, Floor_ Gallery, Seoul, Pingyao International Photography Festival, Pingyao, Lishui Photography Festival, Lishui, Xishuangbanna International Film Festival, Xishuangbanna, ART021, Shanghai, and JINGPHOTO, Beijing.

Awards

Awards including 2022 China Photography Annual Ranking, FORMAT Photography Award, Winner of the Professionals' Choice, Danny Wilson Awards, Photo Fringe, Alice Beck-Odette Scholarship, and Honorable Mention Awards of International Photography Awards.

courtesy of the artist