The Solo Exhibition of Kelly Zhang, President of the New York Branch of the EAAAA, Opens in Parma, Italy
On May 8th, local time, the solo art exhibition "Echoes of the Quiet Heart" by artist Kelly Zhang, the president of the New York branch of the European American and Asian Art Alliance, officially opened at the China Art and Ethnology Museum in Parma, Italy. Peter Huang served as the curator. Through her paintings, the exhibition constructed a poetic emotional space, leading the audience to delve into the artist's inner world and demonstrating her delicate exploration and emotional interweaving between self-awareness and expression, as well as between restraint and release. The exhibition will end on May 22nd.
Searching for the Echo of Life between the Real and the Imaginary
Through soft colors, hazy spaces, and a mysterious sense of form, Kelly Zhang's works present an emotional space filled with a dreamy atmosphere, revealing her perception of the real world and the reflection of her inner world. Through these works, she explores how to discover and endow the moments in daily life with their due significance. Although these moments seem ordinary and fleeting, they conceal rich emotions and thoughts. Through these works, Kelly invites the audience to re-examine those moments that are often overlooked or forgotten and transform them into imaginative existences.
In these works, she has given these silent and fleeting moments a new life, enabling them to transcend simple existence and present profound connotations and aesthetic feelings.
In his opening speech, curator Peter Huang further elaborated, "Kelly's works are like echoes. She weaves her thoughts and experiences, seeking the intersection points between them."
Curator Peter Huang
Artist Kelly Zhang (middle)
Building Modern Fables of the Soul
Each work in the exhibition is a part of Kelly Zhang's inner world, filled with profound self - exploration. Every piece is not just an image, but a projection of emotions, enabling the audience to feel echoes and resonances while quietly appreciating.
The featured work "Swan that Echoes" depicts a swan. It not only exists quietly but also responds to the long - buried and unacknowledged reality. It symbolizes a force that guides inner courage. Through transformation and integration, it reveals a swan that can speak its own language, eyes that can see through illusions, and an environment that can sense temperature according to emotional changes. This work presents a process of interaction between the objective world and self - emotions - seemingly gentle on the outside, but actually a response and awakening deep within the heart.
Swan that Echoes
In "Leaf Drifting in Pink Haven", the scene shows leaves falling from the sky, yet they can never find a stable habitat. The pink sky is Kelly's expression of a sense of belonging, but the leaves are still searching. This work reflects that when people face the uncertainties of life, their hearts are still constantly seeking their own place, even though this path is often filled with confusion.
Leaf Drifting in Pink Haven
2: Kelly Bear & the Metal Garden Rabbit. The theme of stillness and waiting is presented through two paintings. Kelly gazes at a teddy bear and a metal garden rabbit, which remain motionless and rely on the outside world to define their existence. Through this work, Kelly explores the state of mind when people face loneliness and inaction, expressing reflection on and challenges to stillness.
2: Kelly Bear & the Metal Garden Rabbit
The artist's mental picture album of "the moment"
At the end of the exhibition opening ceremony, Kelly Zhang shared her profound thoughts on her works: "My works illuminate many dreams and fictional worlds that I can resonate with. They occur in many forgotten and overlooked moments, because these moments are full of transience - there is no further development, nor is there a specific story to support them. They are simply the embodiment of momentary emotions, containing ideas and feelings. In fact, these'silent moments' are the moments that others usually don't notice, not necessarily just artists. Because these moments are fleeting, I began to notice them. In my mind, they turn into a dreamlike state... No matter what you call them, then I put them back into these objects or moments again, creating a kind of unintentional yet intentional beauty. I like to see how people respond to my works, or you could say, they resonate."
Kelly Zhang conveyed through the exhibition that "Many moments in life, though fleeting, are filled with profound emotions and significance." Her works guide the audience to re-examine those moments that we might usually overlook - those simple fragments without a story background or complex plot, yet carrying the essence of emotions and thoughts. Through these simple moments and reverberations, Kelly Zhang explores how to find one's place and direction in the torrent of daily life.
At the Opening Ceremony
Other guests present at the opening ceremony included the anthropologist and writer P. Tonino Melis, and the Dean of the Conforti Shrine, P. Nicola Colasuonno. Journalists such as Cesare Pastarini from La Gazzetta di Parma and Alberto Rugolotto from Parma Television were also in attendance. The exhibition was co-curated by the curatorial team of the China Art and Ethnology Museum—P. Alfredo Turco, Maurizio Salvarani, Laura Ferrari, Barbara Valla, and Antonio Pupa. It was reported by Abbonati al Magazine, gazzettadiparma, and the Associazione Musei Ecclesiastici Italiani (Italian Association of Ecclesiastical Museums).
