Jiá Fèng annual program at Troy House Art Foundation

The Troy House Art Foundation annual programme “Jiá Fèng” is open to the public on April 25, 2022. Initiated by artist Yuan Gong, “Jiá Fèng” is curated to respond to current socio-political crises and human condition. “Jiá Fèng” means a very limited space—it is referring to people who are recreating a space to stay and survive in such a narrow room. People are looking for the loss during their displacement. When the freedom gradually disappears, where is the freedom of art? “Jiá Fèng” is like a society—a society that is losing its freedom. We are in the “Jiá Fèng”.

“Jiá Fèng” is a dynamic programme that encourages discussion on topics such as geopolitics, war and refugees, politics and art. Open to the public, the programme consists of three distinct projects: Points Art Residency Retrospective, Voices from Ukraine and Points Art Residency 2022. The projects will take shape in the form of exhibitions, screenings and residency open calls.

Points Art Residency Retrospective
“Jiá Fèng” began with Points Art Residency Retrospective exhibition. Started in Jinxi, China—an ancient water town located in Suzhou, Points Art Residency was initiated by Troy House Art Foundation in 2017. With the outbreak of the global pandemic in 2020, Points was forced to suspend the residency programmes and began migrating to another location. The Points Art Residency Retrospective exhibition will present the works of four artists—Javier González Pesce, Yui Inoue, Yuya Suzuki and Lei Yan, in collaboration with S-AIR (JP) as well as a sound piece of a dialogue between Zhenhua Li and Yuan Gong on Gong’s poem “Jiá Fèng”. These works present the boundaries and connections between people and the world in the form of sound, video, installation and public art, and also attempt to respond to the ideal image and symbolic system of the underlying world shared in cross-cultural contexts. Not only do the works present the current reality, but construct a special time-space relationship between history, time, field and event as well.

Voices from Ukraine
Unlike the retrospective, Voices from Ukraine is more of a progressive tense with lost freedom. The first phase will invite artist Nikita Kadan from Kyiv to continuously transmit images, sounds and videos to the exhibition site in the form of an online residency for a month. In addition, a concurrent screening program will feature films on war, migration and borders.

Points Art Residency program 2022
Alongside the other projects, Points Art Residency 2022 is due to be officially launched in the new residency space in Wales and will invite three international artists (including an artist from Ukraine) to join its programme. Situated in Monmouth, the residency is located on the grounds of a seventeenth-century Troy House estate and is surrounded by extensive riverside land. In the backdrop of the main building with its complex and multi-dimensional history, a new home for art is being built.

Points Autumn Residency open call 2022
Application deadline: May 31, 2022
Number of recruits: two
Residency location: Wales and London, UK

Residency for Ukrainian artist
Application deadline: September 30, 2022
Number of recruits: one
Residency location: Wales, UK

Exchange Residency open call
Points UK S-AIR artist residency opportunity in Sapporo, Japan
Application deadline: June 5, 2022
Number of Recruits: one

Organizer: Troy House Art Foundation / Partnership: Points Art Residency, S-AIR / Curator: Yuan Gong / Participants: Alina Gorlova, Javier González Pesce, Lei Yan, Nikita Kadan, Yui Inoue, Yuya Suzuki, Zhenhua Li / Admission: Free / Website.

Past exhibitions and events
Film screening: This Rain Will Never Stop by Alina Gorlova.
Exhibition: In the Shadows of Paradise, Chinese video art since the turn of the century. October 13, 2021–January 12, 2022.