If the world were about to end—if everything were on the brink of destruction—would what we are doing still matter?
In January 2020, having just experienced the grief of bereavement, Loy Luo withdrew from the exhausting rhythm of heavy work and life, arriving in New York in search of spiritual relief and artistic nourishment. For more than a decade in Beijing, Luo had devoted herself to the creation and study of abstract art. As critic Jia Fangzhou noted, “Her works are grounded in two inner qualities: the irresistible philosophical reflection shaped by her intellectual structure, and a poetic sensibility quick to respond.”
Yet in New York—in a city ravaged by the pandemic—Luo could not, as she once did in China, remain absorbed in “matters of the heavens.” Instead, she found herself drawn to the faces of people from around the world, each bearing the full spectrum of human emotions. In the panic of what felt like an apocalypse, these faces became a fertile ground for exploring the essence of human nature.
The focus here is not merely on how she sought to present the “synthesis” of each individual’s inner being, but rather on the artist’s act itself: in the midst of a global pandemic, through depicting countless “others,” she searched for a renewed recognition of her own “self.” Living in the city most severely struck by the virus, the shift in ways of life and work—and the reexamination of the individual self—became the foundation driving this project forward. What began as a journey of exploration was abruptly transformed into the challenge of surviving alongside New Yorkers during the pandemic, touching upon both the collective and individual responses to crisis and sparking a reconsideration of the individual’s social identity. Luo observed and recorded this process firsthand.
If thought were only about survival, there would have been no “Renaissance” after the Black Death of the Middle Ages. Reflection has always distinguished humans from other species, propelling our steps forward. During the pandemic, such reflection may take on an even deeper meaning. As Heidegger once said: “Only when one draws infinitely close to death can one profoundly experience the meaning of life.” The pandemic not only highlighted our existence as a community of life, but also pushed each individual toward a more intimate evaluation of what life itself means.
Installation View
Marx reminds us: “Man is a particular individual, and it is precisely his particularity that makes him an individual, a real and single social being. At the same time, he is also the totality—the conceptual totality, the conscious existence of society. In reality, he exists both as a direct, lived enjoyment of social existence, and as the totality of the manifestations of human life.”
From both a rational and emotional perspective, Luo’s “performance art” was her most immediate and precise philosophical response as an artist. Returning to the opening question—if the world were to vanish, would our emotions still carry the same importance? From Luo’s own words, they evolve “from a subtle, bitter meditation on personal destiny, to a meditation in which personal feeling merges with the vastness of the cosmos.” Thought evolves into action, action produces change, and change generates new meaning.
From the one hundred portraits she painted in New York, we clearly see the masked faces of ordinary people. Yet what we observe is not only the “truth” of each sitter; we also glimpse the shared psychological patterns of a society under plague—a kind of “psychological epidemic” that emerges as the true mark of the time. It is precisely this collective pattern that makes visible the value of “reflection” and “transformation.”
Exhibition Concept – Virtual Hall
Who is “me”? Around this question, Luo designed a small-scale exhibition space. Each portrait was enlarged and suspended in mid-air, evoking the experience of gazing up at monumental portraits on Tiananmen Gate. Here, every face becomes solemn, reverent, and worthy of veneration—a commentary on the enlargement of “self” within society.
Yet, as viewers walk through the space and finally turn back, the portraits have vanished. What remains is an empty room, and floating in the air: the words WHO IS THE “ME”—accompanied by the names of one hundred thousand victims of the pandemic in the United States. Through this reversal, Luo highlights the inescapable importance of the individual: an insistence on the irreplaceable weight of each human life.
Individual and collective, emphasis and erasure, virtual and real—constantly switching between states of recognition.
Rome, July 2020 – Wang Yongxu
Exhibited Works
