Body·Materiality·Expression：Cai Jin(1990-2025)

About the Artist: Cai Jin

Born in 1965 in Tunxi, Anhui Province, Cai Jin currently lives and works in Beijing. She is one of the most representative female artists in China since the 1990s, known for major series such as the Banana series, Flora and Fruit, and Landscape.

Cai Jin’s works have been collected by major art institutions worldwide, including the National Art Museum of China, the Smart Museum of Art at the University of Chicago, M+ Museum of Visual Culture in Hong Kong, and the Shanghai Art Museum. Her practice has been included in multiple editions of A History of Contemporary Chinese Art, becoming an important case study in research on female art and Neo-Expressionism in China since the 1990s.

About the exhibition:

On December 12, 2025, the solo exhibition "Body·Materiality·Expression: Cai Jin (1990–2025)" opened on the fourth floor of Building 1 at Today Art Museum. 

This exhibition systematically traces the evolution of the artist’s creative practice over more than three decades. Through over seventy works—including paintings, installations, and readymades—alongside art criticism, sketches, and documentary footage, it constructs a multi-dimensional viewing framework. From early portrait studies and the iconic "Canna" series, to the pictorial intervention into everyday objects, and further to recent installation practices centered on direct dialogue between objects, the exhibition outlines the distinctive path in Cai Jin's art where "bodily perception—material trace—painting language" intertwine. A substantial number of early sketches and archival materials exhibited for the first time provide new perspectives for understanding the artist’s creative logic.

Cai Jin’s art consistently originates from individual bodily perception, transforming subtle lived experiences into a unique visual language. In her works, the body serves not only as the subject of creation but also as a medium connecting the self and the world. Here, the body functions both as a source of perception and as a channel for engaging with materiality, tracing the imprints of existence itself.