OFF SCRIPT

Text/XX Li

“OFF SCRIPT reflects on the predetermined life script that social discipline writes for us.”

Within specific cultural contexts, individual growth is always accompanied by a set of implicit social norms: When are we expected to enter certain roles? How should we present an image that is broadly accepted? How do we become a “proper” person within an existing order? Over time, these norms gradually form a subtle mechanism of judgment that continuously shapes the way the subject constructs the self.

This exhibition centers precisely on this delicate inner tension. The figures in my work do not point to fixed identities or ages; rather, they function as psychological models carrying multiple layers of metaphor. Beneath their seemingly innocent and naive visual surface lies a humorous form of resistance that does not easily compromise, an untamed curiosity, and a subjectivity that cannot be fully absorbed into an established order and remains in a state of ongoing awakening.

Trees, animals, carousel horses, paintings-within-paintings, flattened backgrounds without perspective, and overlapping spaces together form a psychological theater that drifts between reality, memory, and imagination. At the same time, the insertion of text expands the psychological space of the image, opening up the possibility for viewers to project their own experiences and engage in self-reflection.

Formally, these works move between stylized figuration, semi-realism, and abstraction. Delicate expressions, restrained light and shadow, and intentionally unstable brushstrokes do not attempt to provide an answer, but instead allow a still-unformed way of thinking to remain present.