Tai Kwun | Tai Kwun Contemporary presents DigiRadiance —— Zhang Peili: A Day

Description

Tai Kwun Contemporary presents DigiRadiance | Zhang Peili: A Day, a new digital art exhibition from internationally acclaimed Chinese artist Zhang Peili, on view from 21 Jan to 20 Feb 2026 at F Hall Studio. Curated by Tai Kwun’s Associate Curator Shuman Wang, Zhang Peili: A Day features a newly commissioned eight-channel video installation that explores notions of temporality, illness, and the body. This exhibition creates a new experience of reality through different media technologies, guiding viewers through everyday public and private spaces that reveal an interwoven yet alienated sense of time and space.

In this exhibition, the newly commissioned installation A Day emphasises subjective visual experiences and consists of real-life footage captured from a first-person perspective, along with videos from news sources and surveillance cameras, medical imagery, and data-generated images. Interspersed are scenes of skin peeling, obstructed movements, and everyday observations, which repeatedly appear as flashbacks, giving an impression of futility and aimlessness. They play at constantly changing speeds and camera angles, then lose momentum, and ultimately the camera is dropped – which metaphorically reflects the deviations in psychological states and social norms experienced during an illness. Using the dual dimensions of vision and cognition to understand the concept of deviation, this work explores the passage of time, the limits of the body, and the social metaphors that the mind and body may aspire to reach. In A Day, Zhang mixes footage of everyday life with AI-generated images to create an alternative sense of reality, which resonates with the universal experience of navigating an era of uncertainty.

Since creating his first video work 30 x 30 in 1988, Zhang Peili has explored themes of the mundane, absurdity, futility, and repetition across his artistic career. Through video, he has continuously examined and reflected on social systems and collective consciousness. From his early exploratory practices with media such as videotapes and cathode-ray tube (CRT) televisions to his critical creations in an age of information saturation brought about by the widespread use of the internet and social media, Zhang has consistently focused on the use of media technology.

Regarding his concerns about the techniques of virtual reality, Zhang Peili said: “AI technologies and network technologies have brought a new issue to the image: they are producing a new kind of reality. This reality of the image runs almost parallel to the reality of the ‘real’ world in which we live. They unfold side by side. In my view, I prefer to take fragments of experience, or elements that come from the realm of fantasy, dreams, or the subconscious, and blur them together with shards of lived reality to construct a new reality.”

In recent years, Zhang Peili’s practice has shifted partly towards a contemplation of his surroundings and a reflection on himself, asking how one perceives the limitations of the body and life through the medium of video. This new work maintains his interest in illness and the body but places a greater emphasis on the collection of subjective visual experiences, which differs from earlier painting works that used gloves as a subtle representation of the body, as well as recent examinations of pathological reports and the materiality of organs and bones.

In response to the title of this exhibition, curator Shuman Wang explained: “In this new work, Zhang Peili’s focus on the concept of the ‘new’ remains – new technologies, new artistic languages, and new self-awareness. Starting from the simple idea of ‘a day’, he outlines how life drifts away from everyday scenes, patiently awaiting the passage of time. The figures, sounds, and perspectives in the imagery are composed of countless ‘neighbours’. As discussed by Jewish-French philosopher Emmanuel Lévinas, it is only through these ‘neighbours’ that one truly becomes aware of life’s impermanence and the limitations of one’s own existence.”

DigiRadiance: Conversation with Zhang Peili

Visitors are welcome to join the conversation between Zhang Peili, curator Shuman Wang, and Dr Pi Li, Head of Art, at Tai Kwun on 20 Jan 2026 from 6pm to 7pm. The three speakers will focus on Zhang Peili’s newly commissioned work and will engage in a discussion of his artistic concerns over the past 40 years. They will compare themes such as surveillance and data, temporality, illness and the body, and hygiene and cleanliness – which have consistently recurred throughout the artist’s long-standing practice – to understand the subtle changes in the artist’s language in recent years. The session is open to the public and is free of charge. Please register on the Tai Kwun website.

Zhang Peili: A Day is the third commission of DigiRadiance, a digital programme that transforms the historic F Hall Studio located in Tai Kwun’s Prison Yard into an immersive space with a large- scale audio-visual installation that surrounds viewers. The project aims to reimagine and reinterpret the site’s historical buildings in a digital context, bringing visitors back in time in order to develop a deeper relationship with the structures of Tai Kwun. The new commission echoes the current exhibition series Stay Connected: Art and China Since 2008 by featuring Zhang Peili, a leading first- generation media artist from China.