This exhibition aims to explore the concept of “Memory” and “Trace” by showing the artworks grasping the passage of time passed and its memory from the past as a ‘trace’ and ‘symptom’. The exhibition will mainly be focused on the Chinese artists born after the middle of 1960s, who experienced their youth at the transitional stage within the process of individualization born out of the socio-economic transformation in China. The reason this generation is so special is that they had experienced both the Cultural Revolution and Capitalism when they were young.

As Jacques Derrida explained his theory ‘trace’ over an example of ‘The Mystic Writing Pad,’ everything in the world has a memory as a ‘trace’ and ‘symptom’ in a certain form. In case of the mystic writing pad, it looks like the words written on the board could be completely erased by wiping the words, but actually the trace of it remains at the bottom all the time. Just like this mystic writing pad, the memory of us also remains as a ‘trace’ and ‘symptom,’ and it strongly affects our present with or without intention and makes our future indeterminate. This exhibition intends to find out how this memory as a ‘trace’ and ‘symptom’ could be visually expressed at the artworks by post-70’s Chinese artists.