Amelia Johnson Contemporary is thrilled to present the first solo exhibition of Beijing based artist, Liu XiaoFang. For the younger generation of artists like Liu XiaoFang who have received a traditional art education, their memories of childhood represent an important pool of raw material from which to draw inspiration for their creations.

"I Remember" is the second collection in a series about childhood memory. These are lonely, nostalgia provoking childhoods filled with regrets and dreams. Although possessing of our own childhood memories, memories can become distorted from the truth over time. The line between truth and the imagined starts to converge and these images are presented as dreamlike states of an altered reality. In this second series, Liu XiaoFang again makes use of the little girl dressed in white with a red scarf. This little girl is a symbolic, physical presence of childhood. The artist chooses to combine this symbol with various images; a rainbow, an umbrella, a spaceship to create mirage like worlds within an unreal world.

Diversity is always apparent between the beauty of dreams and the practicality of reality. By choosing the medium of photography, the artist has blurred these lines between illusion and fact. Her choice of imagery conveys a sense of mysticism in these dreamlike compositions. The girl appears emotionless, desensitized, leaving her to appear in a permanent state of dreaming. All negative feelings have disappeared and dissolved in to peace and tranquility.

ABOUT LIU XIAOFANG

Liu XiaoFang was born in 1980 in Datong City, Shanxi Province, China. She studied Photography at the prestigious Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, China.

Demonstrating creativity and ingenuity early in her career, her nostalgic work, "I Remember no.5", was shortlisted in the 2010 Societe Generale Chinese Art Awards. Liu XiaoFang has exhibited in Beijing, China and in Japan and Switzerland. Most recently her work has been featured at Paris Photo, France and at AIPAD, New York, USA. In 2011 the artist was selected by the Musée de l'Elysee as one of today's most promising photographers.