Wen-You Cai: Meandering Recollections - Co-curated by Qianfan Gu and Yiming Wang
We are delighted to announce the site-specific exhibition “Wen-You Cai: Meandering Recollections” at Café China, featuring photographic works by the artist. This exhibition welcomes viewers and restaurant guests on a journey through the artist’s evocative narratives, spanning from February 18th, 2024, to January 28th, 2025. Join us for a year-long voyage of discovery through serendipitous moments and the uncanniness of daily life, all captured through the lens of Wen-You. The opening reception is warmly scheduled for Sunday, February 18th, from 2 PM to 5 PM.
Wen-You has deliberately maintained photography as an amateur pursuit, a means for depicting and archiving her lived experiences. On display in the corridor space of Café China is a wall installation that showcases more than 20 photographs arranged in the style of a family photo wall. The display resonates deeply with Wen-You’s perspective on photography: not as an art form, but as an expressive
visual record that keeps her memories of time spent with friends and family alive and vivid. It underscores the intimate and personal nature of her photographic work, transforming everyday moments into lasting recollections. In addition to the wall installation, the exhibition extends throughout the restaurant, with pieces seamlessly blending into the environment in unexpected nooks. For instance, the series 4 Bathroom Selfies (2016-21) finds a unique home attached to the mirrors in the restrooms, creating a playful and immersive experience. Similarly, Accidental Infinity Room, Cuba (2015) is featured on a rotating frame shelf and encased in a glass cabinet, inviting viewers to engage with the work from multiple angles. These thoughtful placements further emphasize the fluidity between art and life in Wen-You’s practice, urging visitors to stumble upon and engage with art in unexpected moments while dining.
Most of the works by Wen-You on display, embodying a distinctive mix of boldness, whimsicality, and humor, are elegantly framed in vintage pieces from the personal collection of Yiming Wang, co-owner of Café China and co-curator of this exhibition. This collaborative synergy fosters a truly heartfelt and enriching dialogue between two seemingly disparate aesthetics.
In crafting the unique interior of Café China, which reflects the vintage allure of 1930s Shanghai, Yiming drew inspiration from Chaoshou Youlang (抄手遊廊)—an architectural feature from traditional Chinese gardens that called for corridors encircling the garden on opposite sides, like hands or arms in an embracing gesture. This idea profoundly influenced the layout of the staircase area and corridor gallery at Café China, blending practicality with artistic expression. The exhibition’s Chinese title, 攝手遊廊 (which can be directly translated as “photoshooting hand corridor”), is a word-play referencing this architectural concept, positing the meandering corridor as a perfect metaphor for both Wen-You’s photographic explorations as well as Yiming’s passion for collecting vintage treasures.
Installation shots by Wen-You Cai.
