First Floor
191 Wardour Street,
London, W1F 8ZE

Shen Xin

b. 1990, Chengdu, China; Lives and works in An t-eilean Sgitheanach (Isle of Skye), Scotland

Shen Xin is an artist working across moving image, installation, and performance to explore the power structures that define narratives of belonging and migration, as well as their potential re-imagining. Their work challenges dominant historical and political systems and stories, creating layered, polyphonic perspectives that embrace fluid identities and interwoven histories. The work engages with language to nurture connections between people, places, and histories. It is a practice deeply tied to specific locations and communities, recognizing that knowledge is not to be found in objective isolation, but is produced in the interconnection of relationships.

Shelter and exile, understood through the limits and layers of a place, aligns with indigenous ways of learning language—where language is more than just communication; it is a way of forming bonds and understanding the world. This is mirrored in the filmmaking process where film is used as a medium, not simply to document stories but actively shape new ways of understanding. Their work encodes histories, technologies, and kinship ties into moving images, making film a living space where language and knowledge grow together. Using a hybrid approach that blends documentary, fiction, and poetics, Shen Xin examines how beings, animals, plants and belief systems move through time and inhabit space. Their essayistic v...

Shen Xin

Bearing fruit of fondness
2025

Shen Xin

Solar Wheels
2024

Shen Xin

but this is the language we met in, Grounds of Coherence #1
2023

Shen Xin

ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར (The Earth Turned Green)

2023

Shen Xin

ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (The Earth Turned Green)
2022

Shen Xin

Brine Lake (A New Body)

2022

Shen Xin

Commerce des Esprits

2018

BIOGRAPHY

Shen Xin was born in 1990 in Chengdu, China. Currently living in An t-eilean Sgitheanach (Isle of Skye) with their life partner and sometime collaborator Ali Van. Their recent solo exhibitions include but this is the language we met in, Richmond Art Gallery, Richmond (2024); one, arriving at floodplains, MadeIn Gallery, Shanghai (2023); Brine Lake (A New Body), M HKA, Antwerp (2023); ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (THE EARTH TURNED GREEN), Kunstverein Gartenhaus, Vienna (2023); ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (THE EARTH TURNED GREEN), Swiss Institute, New York (2022) and Brine Lake (A New Body), Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2022). Recent group shows include 目 Chine, une nouvelle génération d’artistes, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2024); Another Tongue of Mine, Lisson Gallery, Beijing (2024); Poetry by the Barbarian, ASE Foundation, Shanghai (2024); with AX Archive, àirde na gaoithe, EMPAC at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York (2024); 14th Shanghai Biennale: Cosmos Cinema, Shanghai (2023); 12th Seoul Mediacity Biennale: THIS TOO, IS A MAP, Seoul (2023); Pixel Row Vol.4 Natural Vicissitude, West Bund Museum, Shanghai (2023); Open Your Eyes Underwater, SVA, New York (2022); Ghost 2565: Live Without Dead Time, Bangkok (2022); Language is a River, MUMA, Melbourne (2021); The Rearview Landscape, UCCA Dune Art Museum, Hebei (2021) and 13th Gwangju Biennale: Minds Rising, Spirits Tuning, Gwangju (2021).

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CV

EDUCATION

2014
MFA Fine Art Media, Slade School of Fine Art, University College London, UK

2012
BA Fine Art, Lasalle College of the Arts, Singapore, SG

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2025
Mink and Berry, TINA, London, UK (forthcoming)
Highland Embassy, Collective, Edinburgh, UK (forthcoming)

2024
but this is the language we met in, Richmond Art Gallery, Richmond, BC

2023
one, arriving at floodplains, MadeIn Gallery, Shanghai, CN
Brine Lake (A New Body), M HKA, Antwerp, BE
ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (THE EARTH TURNED GREEN), Kunstverein Gartenhaus, Vienna, AT

2022
ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (THE EARTH TURNED GREEN), Swiss Institute, New York, NY

2021
Brine Lake (A New Body), Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

2019
To Satiate, MadeIn Gallery, Shanghai, CN
Protests Proclamations and Celebrations, University of Connecticut, CT

2018
Methods of Inhabiting, K11 Art Foundation, Shanghai, CN
Sliced Units, Esea Contemporary (CFCCA), Manchester, UK
Records of Rites, MIMA, Middlesbrough, UK

2017
Strongholds, Lychee One, London, UK

2016
At Home, Surplus Space, Wuhan, CN

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2025
The Skin Between Worlds, Qyzqaras film festival, curated program by Netherland's Asian Movie Night, Almaty, Kazakhstan, KZ  
But this is the language we met in, Images Festival, Toronto, CAN
39 Footnotes, Accent Sisters, New York, NY
Resilient Echoes, Art Basel, HK

2024
目 Chine, une nouvelle génération d’artistes, Centre Pompidou, Paris, FR
Another Tongue of Mine, Lisson Gallery, Beijing, CN
Queer Strategies and Tentacles, e-flux online film program
Prosodic Grains, By Art Matters, Hang Zhou, CN
Cinema as a Uniting Language, SINEMA TRANSTOPIA, Berlin, DE
with Xiē, Asian Avant-Garde Film Festival, Mplus, Hong Kong, CN
European Media Art Festival, Osnabrück, DE
Poetry by the Barbarian, ASE Foundation, Shanghai, CN
Becoming Abundance, This is the Time for Grace, Amsterdam, Maastricht, Arnhem, NL
with Xiē, Homely Feelings / On the Go, Asymmetry, London, UK
with AX Archive, àirde na gaoithe, EMPAC at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York, NY

2023
14th Shanghai Biennale: Cosmos Cinema, Shanghai, CN
12th Seoul Mediacity Biennale: THIS TOO, IS A MAP, Seoul, KR
with Xiē, Play and Loop V, Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong, CN
Topologies of the Real: Techne Shenzhen, CN
Beyond Binary, part of Über das Neue, Blickle Kino at Belvedere 21, Vienna, AT
Pixel Row Vol.4 Natural Vicissitude, West Bund Museum, Shanghai, CN
Nián Nián, The Power and Agency of Animal Forms, DEJI Art Museum, Nanjing, CN
Dhaka Art Summit, National Art Gallery, Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, BD

2022
with Xiē, To bind, embed, shimmer, and brace, DAAD, Berlin, DE
Open Your Eyes Underwater, SVA, New York, NY
Ghost 2565: Live Without Dead Time, Bangkok, TH
In Solidarity with ____, OCAT x KADIST, Shanghai, CN
Action as Gesture, Art Museum of Nanjing University of the Arts, Nanjing, CN
ON | OFF 2021: Carousel of Progress, He Art Museum, Guangdong, CN

2021
Language is a River, MUMA, Melbourne, AU
The Rearview Landscape, UCCA Dune Art Museum, Hebei, CN
13th Gwangju Biennale: Minds Rising, Spirits Tuning, Gwangju, KR
Shen Xin + Guest: Tulapop Saenjaroen, Sirius Art Centre, Cobh, IE
Transmissions, Season 3 Episode 3, London, UK

2020
LOOP Barcelona, VIDEOCLOOP, Spain, ES
Why an Archive, Archive Außer Sich, Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art, Berlin, DE
Sino Wharf – From Chinatown to Red Internationalism, OCAT, Shenzhen, CN
PLAY & LOOP, Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong, CN
An Impulse to Turn, Inside Out Museum, Beijing, CN

2019
Sigg Prize, M+ Museum, Hong Kong, CN
RijksakademieOpen, Amsterdam, NL
Neither Black/Red/Yellow Nor Woman, Times Art Center, Berlin, DE
Materializing Memory, University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, PA
Afterimage: Dangdai Yishu, Lisson Gallery, London, UK
Landscape with bear, De Appel, Amsterdam, NL

2018
8102 On Reality, OCAT Shanghai, CN
New Metallurgists, Julia Stoschek Collection, Düsseldorf, DE
PLAY & LOOP, Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong, CN
Screening, Decad, Berlin, DE
Behind the Terrain, Koganei Art Spot Chateau, Tokyo, JP
Emerald City, K11 Art Foundation, Hong Kong, CN
4th New Museum Triennial: Songs for Sabotage, New York, NY
CONDO with MadeIn Gallery, Project Native Informant, London, UK

2017
Frontier, OCAT, Shanghai, CN
Misty Clouds Scattered Colours, Crown Buildings, Liverpool, UK
Pièce Touchée, Para Site, Hong Kong, CN
Urban Implosion, ACC, Gwangju, KR
Nawki by SPUR, Leeds Big Screen, Leeds, UK
BALTIC Artists’ Award, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
Of Time and Space, Hanoi DocLab, Hanoi, VN
Americans 2017, LUMA Westbau, Zurich, CH
Shattered Sanctity, Museum of Contemporary Art Taipei, Taipei, RC
Three Rooms, CAC, Shanghai, CN
The New Normal, UCCA, Beijing, CN

2016
Huayu Young Artist Award, Sanya, CN
Dragon Liver Phoenix Brain, OCAT, Shanghai, CN
You Won’t Be Young Forever, No.235 Guang Fu Road, Shanghai, CN
Pixel Park, Jing’an Sculpture Park, Shanghai, CN
Extravagant Imagination, The Wonder of Idleness, MadeIn Gallery, Shanghai, CN

2015
The Ballad of Generation Y, OCAT Shanghai, Shanghai, CN
Eyes of Sieves, Global Committee, New York, NY
Shoulders of Giants, Birmingham City University, Birmingham, UK
Kagoshima Art Festa, Kirishima Open Air Museum, Kagoshima, JP
Transitória 2: Articulações E (des) encontros, Redbull Station, São Paulo, BR
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, Newlyn Art Gallery, Cornwall, UK
Aesthetica Art Prize, York, UK
Does Not Equal, W139, Amsterdam, NL
18th Japan Media Arts Festival, The National Art Center, Tokyo, JP

2014
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, ICA, The Mall, London, UK
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, Liverpool Biennial, World Museum, Liverpool, UK
21st Century Graduate Screening, Chisenhale Gallery, London, UK
35A Moving Image Festival, Le 6B, Paris, FR
Chinese Visual Festival, King’s College, London, UK
Oslo Screen Festival, International Video Art Festival, Oslo, NO
Difference or Sociality, Woburn Research Centre, UCL, London, UK

2013
Local Futures, He Xiangning Art Museum, Shenzhen, CN
Open Studio, Listhus Art Space, Ólafsfjördur, IS
Cinema as Object, Woburn Research Centre, UCL, London, UK

2012
Peninsula & Islands, Taksu Gallery, Singapore, SG
The Lasalle Show ’12 Exhibition, Praxis Space, Singapore, SG

2011
Deploying Passages, Earl Lu Gallery, Singapore, SG
2nd International Painting Exhibition, Academy of Fine Arts Vladivostok, Russia, RU
Squared Invasion, Instinc Gallery, Singapore, SG
The Winston Oh Travel Award 2011, Praxis Space, Singapore, SG
The Collaborative Prize 2011, Brother Joseph McNally Gallery, Singapore, SG
That’s Another Story, Praxis Space, Singapore, SG

SOLO SCREENINGS, PERFORMANCES AND EVENTS

2025
Provocation of the Nightingale #1, Fudan Art Museum, Shanghai
Burns of a first language, vidéo et après, 18 June, Centre Pompidou, Paris, FR


2024
but this is the language we met in / àirde na gaoithe, with AX Archive, EMPAC, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York, NY

2023
Provocation of a Nightingale #1, ArtReview, London, UK

2019
Double Feature, with Touch Me Not, Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, DE
Synthetic Types, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, NL
Warm Spell, Western Front, Vancouver, CAN

2018
Warm Spell, ICA, London, UK

2017
half-sung, half-spoken, Serpentine Galleries, London, UK

2016
Originally Inclusive, Esea Contemporary (CFCCA), Manchester, UK
Forms Escape: Prologue, Chisenhale Gallery, London, UK

2015
Shoulders of Giants, Senate House, London, UK

RESIDENCIES

2022
The Sister Dennis Frandrup Artists in Residence Program, Saint John’s University, Minnesota, MN

2020
Second Shift Studio, Saint Paul, Minnesota, MN

2019
Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten, Amsterdam, NL

2016
ACC-Rijksakademie Dialogue and Exchange, Gwangju & Amsterdam, NL
Treasure Hill Artist Village Residency, Taipei, RC

2015
Chronus Art Centre Fellowship for Chinese Artist, Birmingham City University, Birmingham, UK

2014
London/Stockholm Residency, SITE Studio, Stockholm, SE

2013
Listhús Artist Residency Program, Ólafsfjördur, IS

AWARDS, GRANTS & SCHOLARSHIPS

2023 - 2024
Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship, Minnesota, MN

2022
MRAC Next Step Fund, Minnesota, MN

2021
Jerome Production Grant, Minnesota, MN

2019
Sigg Prize shortlist, M+, Hong Kong, CN

2017
The Elephant Trust Grant for production of Warm Spell
BALTIC Artists’ Award, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK

2014
Audrey Wykeham Prize, UCL, London, UK

2012
LASALLE Award for Academic Excellence, Singapore, SG

2011
LASALLE Award for Academic Excellence, Singapore, SG
The LASALLE Scholarship, Singapore, SG
The Winston Oh Travelogue Award, Singapore, SG

SELECTED CONVERSATIONS

2024
Solar Wheels and Other Stories, The Asymmetry Distinguished Lecture Series, ‘Critical Habitats’, The Courtauld, London, UK

2022
IMU UR2: Art, Aesthetics, and Asian America, Stanford University, CA

2021
Shen Xin and Alvin Li in conversation, The Courtauld, London, UK
Artist talk, Unsettling and the Asian Union, Sandberg Instituut, Amsterdam, NL

2020
An Impulse to Contemplate, Inside Out Museum, Beijing, CN

2019
Floating Constellation: Border-Crossing Exchanges within and beyond Asia, Spike Magazine, Berlin, DE
In conversation: Shen Xin and May Adadol Ingawanij, ArtReview Bar, London, UK

2018
Dialogues on Sexuality and Longing, CFCCA, Manchester, UK
Triennial: “Songs for Sabotage” Artist Panel Discussion, New Museum, New York, NY

2017
Algorithmic Citizenship & Collective Memory, FIAC, Grand Palais, Paris, FR
Gender Trouble, UCCA, Beijing, CN

2016
Forgetfulness and Objects of Affiliations, Etat Forum, Tapei, RC

2015
To Speak of the Blueprints & To Act on the Gaps, CAC, Shanghai, CN
Panel discussion with Elina Suoyrjö, Does Not Equal, W139, Amsterdam, NL

2014
Chinese Visual Festival Director’s Talk, King’s College, London, UK

2013
Cinema as Object, Woburn Research Center, London, UK

SELECTED TEXTS

2024
LEAP, Habiter le flux, trace noire, fond blanc 白质黑章, Shen Xin
BY ART MATTERS + te editions, the flourishing that has to do with fire, Shen Xin
La Source, Roots and words: Exploring the mirroring of language and ecosystem through art, George Sun
Pancouver, Artist Shen Xin probes deep-seated connections in trees, languages, protests, and evolutionary biology, Charlie Smith

2022
AnOther Magazine, The Artist Revealing the Healing Power of Language, Kate Wong
ArtAsiaPacific, Shen Xin’s Theater of Verbal Imagery, Zoe Meng Jiang
Ocula, Review of ས་གཞི་སྔོན་པོ་འགྱུར། (THE EARTH TURNED GREEN) at Swiss Institute, Chen Chi
Phaidon, Prime: Art’s Next Generation
ArtForum CN, Unlearning, Shen Xin

2021
Times Museum, laib yab, laib yab, letters with Zhang Hanlu

2020
ArtReview Asia, Embracing the Unknown, Mark Rappolt
M+ Museum, Sigg Prize, Interview with Pi Li

2019
CURA, Shen Xin, Alise Upitis

2018
Mousse Magazine, Rules of Traction, Alvin Li
Art Monthly, Sliced Units, Laura Harris
New Museum Triennial Catalogue, Songs for Sabotage, Alvin Li
OCAT Shanghai, Frontier Catalogue, Lu Mingjun
New York Times, Meet Six Disrupters at the New Museum’s Triennial, Hilarie M. Sheets

2017
AQNB, Interview with Human Poney
Frieze, Quilting Points, En Liang Khong
The Art Newspaper, Interview, Lu Mingjun
Lychee One, Shen Xin: Strongholds, Gary Zhexi Zhang
ArtAsiaPacific, Strongholds, Andrew Stooke
Art World, Interview with Yang Yuanyuan
YAC, Interview with Abigail Mitchell

2016
Artforum CN, Critics’ Picks: Shen Xin: At Home, Chen Xi’an
Randian, Artist Profile: Shen Xin, China, or Post-China?, Chen Xi’an
Artforum CN, Critics’ Picks: The Ballad of Generation Y, Liu Na’ou

2015
ArtAsiaPacific Issue 96, New Current - Shen Xin, Dan Munn
UK Now, Shen Xin, Dan Munn
CAC Shanghai, Interview with Nikita Lynne

2014
Bloomberg New Contemporaries, Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2014 Catalogue
Axis Web, MAstar Selected by Kirsty Ogg
99ys.com, Local Futures, Tsaichin Ni

2013
Woburn Research Centre, Difference or Sociality
He Xiangning Art Museum, Local Futures
The Association of Icelandic Visual Artists, SMILING AGAINST GREAT VIEWS (frá Listhús)

TEACHING, WORKSHOPS, CLASSES & INVITED ACADEMIC VISITS

2025
Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK

2024
Emily Carr University of Art + Design, Vancouver, CAN
Goldsmiths University of London, UK

2023
Goldsmiths University of London, UK
Minneapolis College of Art and Design, MN

2022
Yale University, New Haven, CT
SVA, New York; University of Minnesota, MN
Minneapolis College of Art and Design, MN
Goldsmiths University of London, UK

2021
Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Sandberg Instituut, Amsterdam, NL
Sotheby’s Institute of Art, London, UK

2018 - 2019
Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK
Goldsmiths University of London, UK
Newcastle University, UK
University of Manchester, UK
University of Connecticut, CT

CURATED PROGRAMS

2025
An Deò x The One Minutes, curated series, Talla Stafainn in An t-eilean Sgitheanach,Isle of Skye, UK
when filmmaking is a first language spoken to protect, The One Minutes, Amsterdam, NL

2022
The Consonant Unknown, Swiss Institute, New York, NY
The Consonant Unknown, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN

2018
Screening of 'Nightfall' by Anocha Suwichakornpong and Tulapop Saenjaroen, ‘And you will eat and be sated' by Sarai Kirchner, Esea Contemporary (CFCCA), Manchester, UK

2015
Against Guest Host Dispositions: 1/N, CAC, Shanghai, CN

2014
Unorthodox Hosts, Artists’ Film Club, ICA, London, UK

Shen Xin

Commerce des Esprits

2018

Installation view, of Commerce des Esprits, 2018 in Language is a River, Monash University Museum of Art, Melbourne, Australia, 2021.
Image courtesy of the artist and Monash University Museum of Art.
Photo: Christian Capurro