I am an artist of the queer diaspora reimagining Chinese artistic traditions. The distance from both my family's homeland and values drew me to ancient Chinese art, which embodied the distant yet inescapable past. This fixation is embedded in my tumultuous relationship with the traditional philosophies of Chinese culture. The Daoist and Confucian principles of harmony and order, which shaped traditional art, also contributed to the enduring conservatism in my culture. As an artist, I became fascinated by these artifacts whose form and history are intertwined with the same cultural values that have shaped my own life. I reimagine these aesthetic traditions with queer-coded figures to defy their conservative ideals. At the same time, I find solace in their regard for silence, which resonates with my own tacit queerness. This tension between expression and secrecy emerges in my work through the restless layering of different textures and materials. The process buries and excavates itself, reflecting the struggle of grappling with one’s history without the heteronormative understanding of heritage. The figures are concealed by or merged into the artifacts, an act of both protection and confinement. This ambiguity in the materiality of the work and the figures' state of being reflects the vital sensitivity of queer survival. The interplay between person and artifact reveals the hidden pathways of queerness within tradition and how art can carry the voices of those lost in history.

instagram: @josephni.art
email:  josephnijn@gmail.com