Other Rooms

:iidrr Gallery is proud to announce Visual Artist Xuemeng Zhang's solo exhibition, Other Rooms, on view from March 15th to March 26th, 2023. Curated by Penelope Umbrico, this exhibition features 13 works of fine art photography from the artist’s projects. The exhibition will take the viewer on an exploration of imaginary spaces constructed from irregular shapes and explore how personal perception affects our understanding of the world around us.

Other Rooms is a photographic project on the reconstruction of imaginary spaces. Xumeng imagines such spaces as a reflective place in one's mind, where distressing emotional experiences can coexist with a present awareness of one's state of mind. She builds and digitally rearrange images in geometrical and irregular shapes to visualize the structuring of imagined spaces. In this construction, a bird in the wild is trapped in an architectural form and an acupuncture model finds itself lost in an amusement park.

“The displacement of images reflects how visual information is stored and merges over time. I use shapes as entrances and borders in imagined landscapes where opposites coexist and ambiguity is the norm. This project lies at the intersection of perceived reality and built spaces. Each shaped image is a container of emotions, perceptions, and fantasies. Each container is an individual space that complements other spaces, resembling sections of a musical piece. The work questions how imaginary spaces form and function, and how idiosyncratic perception influences and shapes the way we make sense of the world.”                                  

Xuemeng Zhang is a visual artist whose practice is driven by exploring connections between the mind and the eye. Her work navigates between identity and culture, belonging and alienation, and perception and cognition. Zhang was born in Beijing and currently lives and works in New York City. She holds a BA in Psychology and Studio Art from Clark University and an MFA in Photography, Video, and Related Media from the School of Visual Arts.

Zhang's work has been exhibited internationally, including at Arte Laguna Prize Arsenale Nord (Venice, Italy), Untitled Art (Miami Beach, Florida), Kühlhaus Berlin (Berlin, Germany), Blank Wall Gallery (Athens, Greece), Floor_ Gallery (Seoul, South Korea), ZAZ 10TS (New York, NY), Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (Philadelphia, PA), and featured in F-Stop Magazine and Al-Tiba9 Contemporary Art Magazine.