Silent Veins: Integrating Tradition with Innovation
My artistic practice centers on the textures and philosophies embedded in traditional Chinese techniques, particularly full-shape stone rubbing and water-based woodcut. I work with materials that carry time—handmade paper, silver leaf, natural stones, and tea—allowing their inherent qualities to shape the meaning of each piece. Drawing from Daoist philosophy and personal memory, I see materials not as passive tools, but as collaborators in storytelling.
In Gesture of Time, a four-panel folding screen, and Where Mountains Meet, a large-scale collage, I explore the scholar’s stone as both subject and method. These works integrate stone textures, oxidized silver, and layered paper surfaces to reflect the passage of time, cultural lineage, and emotional memory. Through transformation—rubbing, staining, weathering—I let materials speak in their own quiet language.
My work creates contemplative spaces where tradition meets innovation, inviting viewers to reflect on the relationships between nature and humanity, material and spirit, memory and presence.
As I explore the intersection between traditional craftsmanship and contemporary expression, the scholar's stone has remained the core of my creative practice. It serves as both a source of visual and material inspiration and a meaningful reflection of my connection to family memories, cultural identity, and emotional ties. Rubbing and water-based woodcut are two fundamental techniques I have drawn from traditional arts. At the crossroads of these methods, I strive to let the materials speak, making the object a medium for expression and the subject of the narrative.
Influenced by Daoist philosophy, true understanding does not always come through words, but through attentiveness to the rhythms of nature, the texture of silence, and the subtle flow of time. In the Daoist view, stones are not inert matter but manifestations of the Dao itself, formed by wind, water, and time, shaped without will, yet full of meaning. This sensibility has deeply shaped my approach to artmaking. I do not try to impose meaning onto the stone; instead, I listen for what is already there.
The title of my thesis, Silent Veins, draws inspiration from the Daoist concept of “jing guan” (静观), or “quiet observation,” a term found in the writings of Zhuangzi, one of the most influential thinkers of Daoism. In his words: “The perfected person has no self, the spiritual person no merit, the sage no name. He observes the transformations of the world in stillness, without being swayed by external things.” This idea also mirrors the traditional practice of appreciating scholar’s stones—not through forceful interpretation, but through stillness, intuition, and inward reflection.
In this context, “Veins” refers not only to the physical grain of stone but also to deeper layers of meaning: the veins of memory, kinship, and cultural lineage. Silent Veins thus poetically express the vitality and emotion embedded within silent materials—those that do not speak yet pulse with presence, time, and meaning.
From this philosophical foundation, my thesis work unfolds. The scholar’s stone, long admired for its quiet power and abstract beauty, becomes subject and method in my practice. Through rubbing—an act of attentive contact—I begin translating the silent language of stone into image. Each groove, each subtle vein impressed on paper, becomes a trace of time, memory, and emotion. These silent veins are not only geological—they are personal and cultural, linking my present hand to the ancient rhythm of craft and my own familial past.
Gesture of Time explores how material changes and continues under the influence of time through stone patterns, tea stains, and the discoloration of silver leaf. Every detail bears the mark of time, making the work itself a witness to time. Through this philosophical exploration of "material and time," I hope to convey the complex relationships between humanity and nature, culture and memory, spirit and material, and to show the endless potential and important impact of time in artistic creation.
Where Mountains Meet is the second major piece in my exhibition.It is a large-scale collage that unfolds an imagined mountain landscape—an arena where natural forces and cultural memories converge. In this work, stone textures cascade inward like a tidal wave, sweeping from both sides toward the center, drawing the eye into a silent yet powerful axis of movement.
The foundation of this landscape lies in the rubbing of stones—an ancient technique that captures more than form. Using scholar’s stones from my home in China alongside local stones from the Providence River's banks, I collaged their textures into a continuous mountain range. Each rubbing preserves a stone’s unique pattern of veins—natural imprints shaped by time, weather, and geological force. These “veins” are not merely surface marks; they are the silent language of the stone, its way of speaking across centuries. Nature tells its story through them, and cultural memory finds tactile form.
Using these rubbings in my artwork, I create a space where different places and identities can connect—a mountain made of texture, where personal memories and cultural history come together. The stones become vessels of belonging, their intertwined veins reflecting the interwoven paths of my journey: from East to West, from tradition to transformation.
I treated the silver leaf with sulfur, which fastened the oxidation process—the silver surface transitioning from luminous brightness to a subdued, mottled gray. This material change is not simply decorative. It creates a conversation with time, showing how cultural identity develops slowly and changes over time. As the silver darkens, it mirrors how identities are layered, weathered, and reshaped over time.
Each piece of silver leaf, each rubbed texture, contributes to a landscape that is not only seen but also felt. The work moves beyond flatness, becoming spatial and immersive. It invites the viewer to enter the image, walk among the mountains' silent veins, and listen to what cannot be spoken. Like traditional Chinese landscape(山水) painting, this landscape does not represent a literal place. Instead, it evokes an inner geography—a space shaped by spirit, memory, and time.
In Where Mountains Meet, the stone speaks not through voice but through texture. Its veins become lines of memory, echoing across time and culture, inviting each viewer to read their own reflection in its silent pulse.
I consciously allow the materials to take on narrative functions in these two works. The stones are not passive objects but partners that help me tell the story and reflect on the concepts. My creation is a continuation of traditional techniques and an integrated practice that merges bodily experience, family memory, and cultural context. The concepts of "emptiness," "fullness," "blank space," and "time" from Chinese culture engage with contemporary discussions on materiality and emotion. This work is an expression of personal roots and a visual experiment that crosses temporal, spatial, and geographical boundaries through materiality.
My works aim to provide a spiritual space, allowing viewers to pause, reflect, and feel, ultimately finding their emotional sound. Whether through the marks of the hand-crafted or the natural imprints of materials, these details can serve as a bridge across language and culture, evoking a renewed perception of the relationships between people and objects, time and memory, tradition and the present.
Photograph@ Ruby Wang
Alex Wen
Oded Daniely