Hundred Layers of Ink

M+ special exhibition

02.10.2024 — 24.05.2025

M+, Hong Kong

Hundred Layers of Ink-Chine demain pour hier (1990) is the largest work in Yang Jiechang’s celebrated Hundred Layers of Ink series (1989-1999). The artist originally presented it in 1990 in the ruins of a church in Pourrières, France, as part of an installation that incorporated earth extracted from the cemetery outside. After several months of conservation by M+, the work is once again on public display for the first time since then, accompanied by rare documentary footage of the series’ creative process.

In the spring of 1989, Yang Jiechang arrived in Paris to take part in Magiciens de la terre, at the Centre Pompidou. However, the works he brought with him were all held up at the Shenzhen border. The artist then decided to fall back on the fundamental materials and procedures of traditional Chinese art. Day after day, he applied ink and alum to large sheets of Xuan paper, a flexible material normally used for Chinese calligraphy and painting. Over the course of a month, the layers gradually formed a thick crust with a shimmering surface, creating light from darkness.

The Hundred Layers of Ink series has had a considerable influence, anticipating the performative deployment of ink, traceless repetition and other techniques now used in contemporary Chinese art. Although it appears to be an abstract painting, the series draws its inspiration from classical calligraphy and painting, as well as Taoist and Buddhist meditation. She was also inspired by her encounter with the originally blank “wordless stele” of Wu Zetian (624-705), the only female monarch in Chinese history. For Yang Jiechang, each layer of ink is the imprint of a personal action and experience, with both spatial and temporal dimensions.