Axel Vervoordt Gallery is pleased to present the first solo exhibition in Europe by Chinese artist Shi Zhiying (b. 1979, Shanghai). Her seascapes and intricate depictions of rocks and gemstones convey the philosophical tension between emergence and concealment. Shi Zhiying blends Eastern and Western painting traditions, and in recent years, she has focussed on colour experimentation to explore concepts of ephemerality and permanence through the interplay of abstraction and figuration.

Shi Zhiying: Affection for Kinship and the World
By Dr. Shen Qilan

What lies between stone and stone?
Gravitation.

Shi Zhiying creates a new perceptual space on the canvas, evoking the gravitational pull between all things while simultaneously conveying emptiness (空, Śūnyatā) and fullness (盈, Pūrṇatā).

The viewer’s consciousness glides across the painting—eyes drifting from a stone to its reflection in the mirror, then rebounding from this virtual realm to another stone. Weight and colour summon one another; lines and forms guide the gaze, establishing a rhythm between stones that feels infinitely rich and fluid.

In Shi Zhiying’s work, objects share intimacy, and the world is woven from these entities and their hidden relationships. French philosopher Merleau-Ponty wrote in The Visible and the Invisible: “The invisible is the secret counterpart of the visible; it supports the visible from within.”

Here, I borrow the Confucian term “affection for kinship” (亲亲) —originally describing the love for human familial bonds—to articulate the gravitational intimacy between objects in her paintings. This force validates the fullness within emptiness.

Translating the perceptual space of “Full emptiness” (空盈) from Chinese into English poses unique challenges. It fuses “Emptiness" (Śūnyatā) and “Fullness" (Pūrṇatā), akin to Chan Buddhism’s "真空妙有" (wondrous being within true emptiness) or "空性妙用" marvellous function of emptiness). These seemingly paradoxical concepts point to an ultimate reality beyond duality. Terms like “Dynamic Emptiness" and “Luminous Void" may approximate this state.

Over the course of decades of practise, Shi Zhiying has realised that painting is not about crafting images for the eye. It is about translating her singular understanding of the world onto the canvas, materialising consciousness itself.

Notably, she conjures a sense of velocity on the canvas. In an era obsessed with brushstrokes that accelerate perception, she composes eternal time—like Zeno’s "flying arrow at rest." Two black stones (Rock No.8, 2016) seem to traverse cosmic depths. They are not still; they perpetually orbit, bound by timeless kinship. Freed from gravity, they soar by their own will.

Gems on the mirrored surface exist not in isolation but within an intimate spiritual order. Real and reflected stones endlessly illuminate one another, their relationship inexhaustible. Their near-eternal poise recalls Morandi’s silent vessels, Zurbarán’s luminous still lifes, or Muqi’s “Six Persimmons” from Southern Song China. These artists forged new psychic orders in the mundane—a universal form (共相) and an empty form (空相) across eras. Only gravity transcends time.

The invisible is the gravitation between objects across spacetime, between consciousnesses. Shi Zhiying arranges colour and form through this force: “Even a solitary stone exists in relation. Even a lone wave connects to all things.”

Her seas now resonate with greater purity and complexity. Beginning with a single stroke—one begets two, two begets three, three begets all things—she translates her perception of the ocean into brush and consciousness. In one brushstroke, subject and object coexist: they are real yet illusory, affirmed yet negated. The sea breathes; so does she.

This gravitational consciousness flows not only within a painting but between artworks, between stones, and across perceptual space—between you and me. Shi’s canvases, like her mirrors, reflect, echo, and propel our awareness beyond time and virtuality into temporal depths.

This unique spiritual experience becomes artistic material. Her work embodies a primordial yet vibrant state of mind—a new perceptual space. Her paintings breathe, animating the dialogue between viewer and canvas. One senses an altered spacetime when entering her world.

In such art, we see not the world as it is, but our original face—the quality of consciousness. Every stone abides, dignified and free.

Shi Zhiying says that as she paints, she hears echoes in the air— waves colliding with time, mirrored stones witnessing their shadows.

The world is empty-full.

Only the moon on stone, indifferent to past or present, illuminates the night.

The stone is the bright moon.
The moon, too, is but a great stone.

Guided by the artist’s brush, our minds journey from “the realm of self" to a state of being “oblivious to the world and self”.
All beings in the cosmos, all things in kinship.

Shi Zhiying, All Things in Kinship

Pictures of the exhibition