Yin Siwen

Born in 1990 in Zhuanghe City, Liaoning Province.

Graduated with a Master’s degree in Oil Painting from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in 2017, under the guidance of Professor Liu Gang. During his studies, he received the “Yi Lian” Scholarship from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, participated in the “Footprints·Youth” exhibition, where he won the First Prize for Collective Creation, and received the “Art Exploration Award” during the 12th Open Studio Day of the Oil Painting Department. His articles and works have been published in professional journals such as Art Grand View and China Fine Arts News.

Currently, he serves as the Deputy Director of the Academic Affairs Department at the Graduate School of the China Academy of Art, and holds the position of Third-Class Fine Arts Instructor.

Creative Inspiration

Yin Siwen's painting concepts stem from the contemporary individual's encounter with screens, digital images, and the world of image landscapes, exploring how one can find the relationship between human existence and the essence of art within the "reality of images."

Artist Yin Siwen first focuses on the essence of artistic language, such as form, temperature (cool and warm), structure, and sketch relationships. The initially set image narrative gradually weakens and dissolves through each layer of glazing and adjustment. The point-like "matrix" gradually builds up, creating electronic colors and grid patterns, resembling the packaging of fashion consumption. In works such as Future Vision Series and Unseen Care, one experiences the sci-fi, cold, metallic gloss and futuristic visuals. The artist’s imagination of the future also reflects the transformation of nature and technology into new subjects, exhibiting a post-anthropocentric appearance: without a center, fragmented, mechanized rationality, exaggerated forms, and blurred boundaries between reality and illusion.

The Hidden "Everyday" Traces

Yin Siwen's painting technique can be traced back to the multi-layer glazing techniques of European medieval tempera. However, the medium today offers greater freedom of expression. Layer upon layer of color conceals the image, extending the logical center of language through repetitive, non-narrative extremism, creating a new concept of painting with action and reconstructed imagery. His actions are not one-off performances (performance art), but repetitive, time-consuming, understated, and non-expressive, quasi-daily acts. Objects are equivalent to traces—traces of time, psychology, and the environment—ultimately leaving "everyday" traces on the surface of the painting.

"Saying the Unspeakable"

Yin Siwen prefers to express rich conceptual meanings through hidden or concealed methods. His conceptual paintings, at first glance, attract attention with abstract visual language, yet the works radiate a strong sense of alienation and "loneliness." Under the layers of continuous concealment, the initial narrative and information of the image are gradually dissolved, becoming illusionary and transformed. The space of the painting, due to the pre-set structure, then tends toward abstraction. These "concealed images" no longer carry narrative as the "main body." Instead, the spatial structure of the painting is composed of multiple, flattened color dots, folding abstract and figurative spaces, gradually completing the artist’s continuous approach toward repetitive extremism.

The Art of "Residual Space"

Li Yuhuan, in his book The Art of White Space, once stated: "Even if only a single stroke is drawn, if it can disrupt the visual balance of the entire painting, it will inevitably bring the outside space into play." This can be likened to the sound of a gong echoing endlessly. Yin Siwen, in his layers of glazing and concealed colors, hides psychological, perceptual, and emotional experiences, breaking norms and boundaries, inspiring the audience to feel the deeper meanings behind the artworks through imagination and experience. The continuously extended color points form changing spatial characteristics, resonating with the space beyond the painting's edges.

"The Moment" Generated Through Repetition

"I often examine the relationship between the materials, narrative, language, personal emotions, and the reality and historical context in which the work exists." Yin Siwen, through his exploration of painting language, engages not only in a dialogue with art history and reality but also in a parallel and symbiotic relationship with life. The rebirth of new painting is not a mere repetition of past styles. Concepts have endowed painting with more forms, with transformations in explanation, creation origins, subject matter, production process, aesthetic characteristics, appreciation methods, presentation forms, combination structures, time-space principles, and evaluation criteria.

"At least eight layers of color glazes are applied, and in some areas, the layers may scratch and reveal complex colors from different layers. I think it’s especially beautiful. It's like a digital program bug or glitch, a highly regulated image that produces unexpected effects, like an error in printing." From his questioning of the image to his processing, transformation, and reconstruction of language and imagery, each of Yin Siwen's works is unique. Each piece is different, and these accidental flaws generate the "moment" of unique emotion.

The Significance of Repetition in Creation

"In the process of repetition, one finds misalignment and difference. Does repeated labor have any meaning? It’s not merely about experiencing the process and accumulating results over time. Another possibility is that in the repetition process, a misalignment and difference form, because no action can be completely replicated." Yin Siwen's new works in the Future Vision Series and Unseen Care present the complexity of brushstrokes or the repetitiveness of actions, like the repetitive motion of beads during meditation. This consensus within the Chinese artistic community, where many artists unintentionally use the same creative method—continuously, repetitively, and sometimes performing a monotonous task until the artist is satisfied—appears as a seemingly endless creative process. This process is not just a form; it represents an East Asian way of thinking. It creates an independent cultural system, an aesthetic system, and a value system. Extremism, in this sense, is not merely a creative method on the practice level; it is an interpretative logic derived from Chinese culture.