Huang Peishan

Through photography, intensive post-production, and AI processes, the artist creates "interfaces of illusion" that challenge image authenticity and the politics of vision.

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

Fotografiska Shanghai is pleased to present Crack in the Curtain, the first institutional solo exhibition of artist Huang Peishan, opening on March 13, 2026. Through a poetics of visual language, the exhibition investigates the evolving dialogue between image and space in the digital era.

In an era where digital post-processing and artificial intelligence are deeply involved in image production, the traditional authority of photography as a “witness to reality” is undergoing profound reconfiguration. Huang Peishan’s work acutely captures this contemporary inquiry. Beginning with photography, she employs digital editing, AI generation, and cross-media techniques such as composite printing and resin casting to transform images into tangible, tactile presences. These works retain the appearance of images as documentary evidence while revealing carefully designed digital and physical fissures across their surfaces, ultimately becoming “interfaces of illusion” that drift between reality and fiction.

The exhibition constructs a metaphorical environment for embodied encounter. Everyday elements—shower curtains, railings, mirrors, flowing water—are extracted and reassembled to form landscapes that feel at once familiar and estranged. These works destabilize boundaries between private and public, allowing contradictory relationships—shelter and discipline, safety and exposure, intimacy and distance—to coexist and intertwine within a shared spatial and temporal frame.

The “crack” serves as the core curatorial motif, symbolizing the inevitable failure of systems of concealment within contemporary visual culture. Through apertures in curtains, ruptures in fabric, and fractures in mirrors, the artist discloses fluid truths beneath surfaces while offering viewers new apertures for seeing. This liminal condition—suspended between revelation and concealment—constitutes the creative terrain that Huang Peishan persistently explores.

Crack in the Curtain not only surveys the artist’s recent trajectory but also stages a speculative arena in which viewers are invited to reexamine the authenticity of images, the perception of space, and the politics of vision. The exhibition will be on view through 19 July, 2026, accompanied by a series of artist talks and workshop events.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Huang Peishan (b. 1994, Dali, Yunnan) is a multimedia artist based between Shanghai and New York. Working across photography, moving image, soft sculpture, and site-responsive installations, her practice investigates the interwoven relationship between physical and emotional landscapes. She is particularly drawn to the poetic potential of objects and space, using material and form to evoke layered narratives. Recently, her research has focused on artificial nature and spatial storytelling, examining their symbolic weight and functional roles within contemporary culture.

Huang Peishan graduated from Communication University of China with a BA in 2018, and received her MFA in Fine Art from Maryland Institute College of Art in 2022. Her recent solo exhibitions include "Imagine a Returning Arrow", 2025, Inna Art Space, Hangzhou, "The Six Mysteries of Fountains", 2025, 743 ART lab, Shanghai, "Meandering the Labyrinth", 2024, BA Project, Shenzhen; "Reunited in an Instant", 2024, MOU MOU, Beijing; "Remade Scene", 2024, Gene Gallery, Shanghai; "Ripples and Folds", 2023, Inna Art Space, Hangzhou; "Artist's Table", 2023, Inna Art Space, New York; ‘re:replicate’, 2022, :iidrr Gallery; "Paradise", 2021, Ultramontane Gallery, Hangzhou. Her works have been exhibited at Chambers Fine Art, New York; M+B Gallery, Los Angeles; Latitude Gallery, New York; San Sheng Art Space, Toronto; Three Shadows Photography Art Center, Beijing; ShanghART Gallery, Shanghai; Ox Warehouse, Macao; Times Art Museum, Chengdu; Westbund Art and Design, Shanghai; Photofairs Shanghai; Beijing Dangdai Art Fair; and Art Shenzhen.

With Special Thanks: NIPPON PAINT CHINA

The wall coatings for this exhibition were provided by Nippon Paint China. Since entering the Chinese market in 1992, Nippon Paint China has been committed to its corporate mission of "Refreshing wonderful living space." Through continuous exploration and innovation, the company has developed a wide range of colors, products, and services tailored to the needs of the Chinese market and consumers, helping to bring the public’s vision of a better life to life.