The End of The World Is Forever (2021)

linocut, charcoal, pencil, ink and acrylic on tracing paper, sawdust, and photographs

4x13x16ft; scroll dimensions 1x42ft

The print repeated throughout this scroll references Fisherman's Evening Song, a Chinese landscape painting by Xu Daoning (c. 970–1053) which depicts deforestation during the Song Dynasty. By combining the linocut image of the stripped mountainside, imagery of colonial logging in Rensselaer County, and modern photos of local timbering embedded in sawdust, this installation interrogates the scale of time in considerations of human-land relations.

At the same time, the stark palette and abstract marks which obscure and degrade the image also speak to an interior existence, and the emotional toll of living in a time of perpetual crisis; it remarks on the damaging capitalistic tempo that is as much a strain on the human psyche as it is on the environment. The continuous handscroll format of the piece acts as a resistance to the speed of modern-day art consumption, in hopes of re-establishing an embodied pace in the viewer’s perception of the work.

The title, and repetition of the central image, are a reminder that humanity has encountered many moments of near apocalypse before – and that perhaps we are only in one stage of the ongoing cycle.

Made with the support of Queens Arts Fund New Work Grant and NYFA City Artist Corps Grant, and presented at Tutu Gallery and Arts, Letters & Numbers.

Photography by Paul Takeuchi

Installation support by Norton William

WEIHUI LU

WEIHUI LU