Born from the split trunk of a tree, Adonis is a deity of vegetation and rebirth in Greek mythology. The exhibition’s title comes from artist Siyi Li’s visit to the Rijksmuseum in the Netherlands, where he encountered Hendrick Goltzius’s Dying Adonis (1609). Hanging high above eye level, the painting captures Adonis lying on the grass, fatally wounded during a hunt. His blood, mixed with Aphrodite’s tears, seeps into the soil and gives rise to a red anemone.
Li is drawn to these fleeting yet poetically charged moments that suddenly shoot intense, sharp but ethereal imprints on the retina. As the artist reflects, however, “one can only look up at the painting,” enveloped by its aura yet powerless to preserve it. Based upon temporality, the exhibition unfolds into a series of sculptural works modelled after discarded firework batteries and an installation copied after a waiting room. Like torn wrapping paper, spent fireworks, or laser-printed images, these particular materials bear witness to moments once deemed worth remembering—before the explosion, before the unwrapping, before the shutter. Layered movements, bodily gestures, and memory-driven interactions permeate both series, culminating in a visual rhythm of preservation and transformation. SHOT—a split second in which perception is amplified to its threshold.
“After loss and pain, all we can do is cultivate something beautiful. Perhaps one day, we will have a garden.” Fragmented memories and emotions take form, striving to nurture resilience from their fragility and transience. In the hindsight of the exhibition, flowers slowly bloom and decay, disrupting the pristine space with its performative monument to impermanence. The cycle persists—yet how do we foster resilience within it?
at Antenna Space, Shanghai
until May 5, 2025
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