Minhong Yu - New Hometown
New Hometown (2019)
Single Channel colour HD Video
6'26"
Yu Minhong
I first met Minhong at the presentation of her solo presentation "Breath" in 2018. A fantastic presentation with a claustrophobic atmosphere, which brought back many associations with my own time spent in Beijing. The work fascinated, and the tension she managed to capture left a lasting impression. I am now excited to present another of her works, New Hometown, in which the silence is deafening as she balance the relationship between her own youth and her current experience as a resident of the Netherlands.
Minhong Yu grew up in the neighbourhood of the smog factories of Dalian. Smog now connects her childhood memories with the new overseas residence. She presents the polluting factories of her hometown and the Dutch seaside factory as contributors to a beautiful landscape, where air, smoke and water are the links for transportation, also between these two continents. Smog has become the invisible medium that connects these otherwise distant worlds softly together. To Minhong Yu the voice of silence is the highest state of bonding.
Minhong Yu was born in China and currently lives and works as a visual artist and curator in the Netherlands. Minhong Yu graduated from the China Central Academy of Fine Art in Beijing in 2013 and obtained a degree at Sandberg Instituut in 2016. Minhong inhabits two cultures simultaneously, creating a poetic dialogue between them, which represents a state of imbalanced power and sense of belonging.