Linlu Zhang

Born in 1996, Nantong, China

Lives and Works in Beijing, China

03/2020 Against the Grain/Southwark Park Galleries/London

10/2019 On Their Shoes/Royal College of Art/London

05/2019 Imagined Communities/The Crypt Gallery/London 04/2019 Fragmentation/The Coningsby Gallery/London 

04/2019 Material Statements/Dyson Gallery/London 

03/2019 Hockney Exhibition/Hockney Gallery/London  

01/2019 Work in Progress Show/Royal College of Art/London  

01/2019 The Energy of Invisible Elements/Royal College of Art/London 

06/2018 Degree Show (BA)/Jiangsu Second Normal University/Nanjing

10/2017 National Encouragement scholarship    

04/2017; 09/2017; 11/2017 The First Prize Scholarship    

In my practice asemic writing is employed by using Pu’er tealeaves on different materials including paper, ceramics and metal. Asemic writing fuses text and image as a unity. It’s a way to build a connection between me and others, and it can be hard to define as the boundaries between writing and drawing become blurred. It shows not merely the extension of memory, but also the transformation of ideas and forms through this creative process. 

We naturally communicate text in an unspoken context, however, the context itself that makes this communication possible is rarely mentioned, asemic writing makes central this phenomena.

My study of Chinese calligraphy led to the notion of asemic writing and considering how these texts are often seen as image only in a western context. Through my practice of PU’ER , tea sometimes functions as

more than tea; it acts also as a mirror, reflecting Oriental context and ideology. It is more about using body and perception, a wordless open semantic form of writing: the spirit of asemic writing.

In addition to myself, I consider many artists whose practices are also based on nonsense aesthetics and has asemic concerns, principally Zhang Xu, Huaisu, Henri Michaux, Susan Hiller and Bosco Sodi who’s cross-linguistic interplay of the theoretical with the practical remains inspirational.