Xie Fan’s paintings delve into the intersections of nature and humanity, microcosm and macrocosm, figuration and abstraction, and the organic and the inorganic. In this new series, titled after Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Xie interprets the narrative as a cinematic voiceover, progressing beyond his earlier series Celestial Signs and Dionysus’s Screen. He alternates between the perspectives of the solar and ancient Greek Dionysian gods, creating a heightened dimensional view — a world rendered as an eternal cycle.

For over 20 years, two collections of archival photography have served as sources of inspiration for Xie: a vegetation survey from Jiangsu Province and an industrial ceramic density report. These visual research materials form the foundation of two interwoven worlds — the organic and the inorganic — arranged and collaged on his “material walls” in a manner akin to the editing of a film, allowing the images themselves to narrate a story.

By employing terracotta — one of the earliest media for painting — Xie explores the relationship between painting on terracotta tiles and images on walls. He creates painted imagery of photographic images on walls, forming a continuous loop of perspective inside and outside the frame, echoing Nietzsche’s understanding of the world as an eternal cycle. Each work is both a material experiment and a philosophical meditation, where fire, chance, and historical resonance converge.

“The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again, and you with it, speck of dust!” — Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche

In this exhibition, Xie presents ten new works that transcend traditional painting, embracing the cyclical nature of existence and the eternal return, inviting viewers to contemplate the interplay between materiality, time, and perception.