Zhang Mengjiao

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Yiwei Gallery is pleased to present the American debut exhibition of Oakland-based Chinese artist Zhang Mengjiao. This exhibition includes her two latest photographic series, Flat Power, and We Don’t Speak the Same Language, accompanied by an immersive sound installation. 

Zhang Mengjiao received her MFA degree from San Francisco Art Institute in 2020 with honors. She works primarily with photography, sculptural installation, and performance video. Zhang examines the social issues that revolve around her identity as a woman of color, a Chinese immigrant, and a human being.

In Flat Power Zhang compares historic representations of traditional female beauty and authority to how Chinese women appear in today’s social media. Using elements associated with female beauty such as makeup and fashion accessories, she deconstructs feminine beauty to ask the question: how can one subvert this dominant discourse?

Zhang’s childhood nostalgia for visiting animals at the zoo evaporates in her series We Don’t Speak the Same Language, as she examines the irony and artifice in the manufactured landscapes of the menageries there.  Using a large format camera, the artist eschews photographing the animals and explores deeper how further artifice can emerge from the photographic process.

This exhibition is hosted by Kylin Gallery in Beverly Hills, California. 

To make an appointment to view the exhibition, visit https://app.acuityscheduling.com/schedule.php?owner=20142073.

For inquiries, please contact YiweiGallery@gmail.com