Collection: Min Ding

Min Ding works in Hangzhou, and her art is not trying to comfort anyone. She has described it as cinematic, a reflection on the subconscious, on death and on anxiety.

Her best known pieces are stop motion animations built on miniature sets. Fox Spirit, adapted from the classical Chinese story collection Liaozhai Zhiyi, follows a fox who collects beautiful men and turns them into mannequins. Ding rewrote the old tale so that the fox holds the power, and she has been direct about why. She sees a society that drives people to sad extremes in the pursuit of beauty, and she has said plainly that women in China still need more equality. Her work has shown in galleries in Beijing, Shanghai, Los Angeles and New York.

The drawings we carry map the same territory, and the titles tell you where you are before you look: Sleep Paralysis, Decompose, Lurk, Hiding Place, Confession, Breed, Feed, Wolfman, Lice. These are the fears that come out of violence, sex and loneliness, and Ding has said she is interested in how society instils them rather than treating them as private problems. Set among those are Meditation, The Bodhisattva in the Fire, and Draw a Snake Outside of Its Hole, where Buddhist imagery and Chinese idiom carry the same weight by quieter means.

She has said she wants to build fantasies that stimulate viewers and encourage them to experience an image rather than glance at it. Her drawings ask for that kind of attention. They reward sitting with, and they do not resolve neatly.

The prints run as a single series at one size and price. We also carry the Living Things Drawing Series art book, which gathers the work together, and a tote bag printed with the Rain design.