Isaac Chong Wai participates in Falling Up at Outside Art Space (12/06/2026)
Isaac Chong Wai is participating in Falling Up, a group exhibition curated by independent curator Leo Li Chen and on view at Outside Art Space in Beijing from May 19 to September 19, 2026.
Taking the increasing precarity of intellectual and creative labour as its point of departure, the exhibition explores the tension between creative exhaustion and the demands of everyday life. Bringing together eight artists at different stages of their careers, Falling Up examines how individual lives and inner spiritual aspirations can be situated amid social norms and institutional pressures. The exhibition also features newly commissioned works developed in direct response to its central theme.
In Isaac’s 𝘊𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘳𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦/𝘜𝘯𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘳𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘛𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘴, the double screens are installed vertically, juxtaposing comparable expressions: crying unemotionally, sobbing without tears, or wailing with eye drops, along with the decorative chains descending bit by bit from the eyes just as though a passage is paved for the teardrops. The segmented emotions embodied by acting, feelings, thoughts, and expressions infer the dialectical sorrow between the controllable and uncontrollable and the liminal state of performing and authenticity.
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