“The weak are not weak from the beginning, and the strong cannot remain strong forever. When the fortunes of the world suddenly change, the heel of invasion war rises, and wars of revenge arise. Invasion inevitably causes war. Therefore, how can there be a war for peace? How can anyone consider it happiness when their nation’s thousand-year history is severed by foreign invasion, and millions of people become slaves and beasts under the tyranny of foreigners? Ah, how can the ‘sword’ be omnipotent, and how can ‘force’ be victorious?”

The Independent – Excerpt from “Overview of Impressions on Korean Independence,” November 3, 1919Han Yong-un (1879–1944)

With RIPPLES, we aim to analyze both past and present colonial impacts, including territorial invasion and the appropriation of physical objects or creative ideas that led to misrepresentations and injustices. We observe the vilification of the unfamiliar and the celebration of the self by revisiting or reinventing one’s identity to endure and heal through the wounds.

Who among us does not belong to the diaspora? Globalisation, one might argue, in the context of colonialism and capitalist economic turns, but transnationalism that transcends imperialistic hegemony requires conscious, thoughtful, and careful translation/mediation. When transnationalism, whether it be geographical, social, or conceptual, is imposed and controlled, it perpetuates colonisation through hierarchy and violence, often in ways so subtle they reach the level of the subconscious.

By embracing the ripple, the waves over time, we aim to unlearn our current knowledge by reassessing the presence of colonial influences, proactively adopting new ways of thinking and practice, and celebrating that were once lost, repressed, or omitted. This polyvocal process may be painful and risk conceptual appropriation. Thus, we gathered as a group aiming to cultivate full consciousness, transparently displaying each intention, and learning from the diverse strategies of different entities and individuals.

While sharing our own insights, we invite you to continue this dialogue with us to expand the diversity of strategies we could take to analyse decoloniality. Therefore, we cordially invite you to the artist talks and workshops. Together, we can further explore themes like the history of control, resistance, and knowledge; transnational ways of knowing and valuing repatriation; and the emergence and rediscovery of hidden narratives as the ripples of diaspora flow.

RIPPLES presents an evocative collection of installation, film, painting, photography, and mixed-media works by 20 emerging artists from the Royal College of Art (RCA). Directed by Jane Lee, Luis López, María Helena Toscano, Polo Farerra, and Ume Dahlia, along with six other curators, this exhibition challenges conventional narratives and delves into decolonial discourse through personal and communal lenses.

In our belief that there is no singular way to address decoloniality, we initiated an open call, inviting artists and curators at RCA to exchange their intimate reflections on decolonialism. Upholding principles of openness, care for reparations, and reflection, we selected 20 artists/teams and eight curators, each establishing a cohort that reflects their varying visions on the topic that ranges from discourses on diaspora communities to generational trauma and related social and cultural phenomena.

Under the themes of observing the history of control, resistance, and knowledge; transnational ways of knowing and value repatriation; and hidden narratives emerging and re-discovering identities, RIPPLES explores how decoloniality can be analyzed and mediated in contemporary times and offers an intergenerational platform to initiate and reflect on the decolonial discourse, not from the imperialist viewpoint but from personal narratives.

The exhibition will feature engaging conversations with curators during the private view and an array of programs throughout the exhibition period, such as artist talks that delve into the range of practices and performances of a healing ritual aimed at addressing the impacts of colonialism.

RIPPLES is supported by Hypha Studios and made possible by Sugar House Island.

EVENTS

August 08       6:00-9:00pm    

PV |  Performance by Ume Dahlia & María Helena Toscano and Patrick Ziza, followed by the directors’ talk | Drinks by @jimandtonicdistillery

August 16        7:00-8:00pm   

Artist Talk 1 <Generational Trauma | History of control, resistance, and knowledge>
Feat. Chrysa Kanari, Gugan Gill, Canaan Brown, moderated by David Tomlinson

August 23       7:00-8:00pm    

Artist Talk 2 <Value Repatriation | Transnational ways of knowing, unlearning>  
Feat. Weng Io Wong, Lujane Pagganwala, Amy Sarr, moderated by Sylvia Tan

August 30       7:00-8:00pm    

Artist Talk 3 <Shifting Boundaries | Hidden narratives emerging, re-discovering identities>
Feat. Ume Dahlia, Polo Farrera, Emily Alice Mitchell, moderated by Pon Chanarat

Jane joined the organizing team, the LADRA collective, after the open call process and developed the exhibition narrative and curatorial notions of the exhibition. She was also in charge of acquiring the venue sponsorship from Hypha Studios & Sugar House Island, promoting Seb’s Art List, RCA, and many other outlets, and constructing the website for the digital experience of the exhibition.

CURATORS

• DAVID TOMLINSON is a London-based curator focussing his research on marginalised experience, particularly queer voice within diaspora and processes of emergence. David researches and presents LGBTQIA+ narrative from works in the Tate collection, most recently British Art Nouveau and the Shock of the Aesthetes (2023) and Logical/Biological: Queer family and Rene Matic (2024). Previously, David worked long-term within communities in the UK and Nigeria as writer, editor and school leader. David has written and presented for the Guardian, CAFOD and Scholastic Publications and spoken for VSO on BBC Radio 4. David’s piece ‘Yesterday’s Darling: the Remarkable Return of Pauline Boty’ will be published in Silicone in Autumn 2024. website | Instagram
• HUIYUI LAN has followed an intuitive approach to life from childhood, believing in a higher spiritual presence that shapes destiny. Her artistic journey has led her towards experimental exhibition forms that explore the boundary between reality and illusion. Huiyu excels in addressing objective issues through metaphysical and abstract expressions. With a background in theatrical character design, she is deeply fascinated by Eastern philosophy, history, Western philosophy, theosophy, and metaphysical new experimentalism. Her curatorial work often breaks traditional boundaries, exploring the intersections of time and space, and seeking to unveil deeper meanings behind everyday life through art. Huiyu aims to encourage audiences to think and reflect on the world they inhabit. instagram
• JACQUELINE SCHWARTZ is a London-based curator focusing on public programming in cultural institutions. She holds a degree in Museum Studies and History from UCSB and is currently researching for her MA in Curating Contemporary Art from the Royal College of Art. Jacqueline has worked in collaboration with many arts-based organisations, including roles at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Olympia Auctions, Gazelli Art House, Hoxton Radio, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara. She also co-founded Entheoscope Magazine, serving as Chief Content Curator since 2021. Her practice blends roles as researcher, artist, host, and mediator, using her background in anticolonial museum theory to critique Western cultural institutions and connect academia with practical discourse. | instagram
• JANE LEE is an art director and independent curator based in London, UK, and Seoul, Korea. She adopts “constellation curating,” a holistic approach that integrates diverse domains, experimenting with various curatorial methodologies to enable practitioners to flourish in creative and self-sufficient ways. Her notable works include curating LAAD for William Blake’s Universe at the Fitzwilliam Museum (2024), establishing an artist residency at Seoul National University (2023), founding and directing an alternative space Punto Blu Seoul (2018-2022), producing Netflix: The Massacre of Kingdom (2021), managing Smog Free Tower Project at Gwangju Design Biennale (2017), and assisting Wrap around the Time at Nam June Paik Art Center (2016). She earned a BA in Economics and Visual Arts at Brown University (2013), a diploma in Art and Business in the Contemporary Era at Sotheby’s Institute of Art in London (2011), and an MA in Curating Contemporary Art at the Royal College of Art. (2024) website | instagram
• LUIS LOPEZ is a visual artist, archivist, and independent curator. He completed the BA in Contemporary Arts from the USFQ (2018) with a minor in Art History and the postgraduate diploma in Art Applied to Society from Überbau_house (2021). He participated in the HABEAS DATA VI residency for Contemporary Art Research (2019). He is currently pursuing an MA in Curating Contemporary Art at the RCA (2024). He was the mediation assistant for the NAW exhibition parallel to the XIV Cuenca Biennial (2018). He curated exhibitions at El Domo (Fretless Foundation), Chawpi, No Lugar, Puente Art Lab, Khôra, Espacio Violenta (Guayaquil), Cumandá Urban Park and the Contemporary Art Center of Quito. website | instagram
• PON CHANARAT is an interdisciplinary curator with a diverse background that spans carpentry, cultural studies in film and literature, and social theory. With a deep understanding of dealing antiques and experience as a gallery manager for bespoke functional art, he brings a tangible appreciation of craftsmanship and history to his work. Currently refining his curatorial skills in contemporary art at the prestigious Royal College of Art, he merges his diverse expertise and interest in history to create thought-provoking exhibitions that bridge the past and present, blending the tactile with the theoretical. instagram
• SYLVIA TAN is a curator based in London, Hong Kong, and Shanghai. Her curatorial concerns center on space, border, and diaspora, exploring in these contexts cross-cultural experience, visibility of antagonism, and the power dynamics between individuality and structurality. She has had curatorial engagements with institutions including Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA Edge), Para Site, and Power Station of Art. She has also worked in galleries and art fairs, including David Zwirner and Art Basel. She received her BA in Cultural Management from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (2023) and is currently studying in MA Curating Contemporary Art at the Royal College of Art. website | instagram
• TIM C. HUANG is a graduate of the University of Leeds with a first-class honours Bachelor’s degree in Art and Design (Industrial) and is pursuing a Master’s degree in Curating Contemporary Art at the Royal College of Art in the United Kingdom. His extensive experience includes project management for the scenic design of Puy du Fou’s Shanghai indoor theme park, City of Lights, in 2021. In 2020, he interned at Bold Tendencies, a prominent public art space in London, and curated an online exhibition for the 20-21 Visual Arts Centre in Scunthorpe, UK. Complementing his curatorial expertise, Tim is also a sculptor and performance artist. He exhibited in the FUAM Prize Exhibition at Leeds in 2022 and showcased his paintings in the experimental exhibition “Commence in Five Minutes” the same year. instagram

ARTISTS

• Amy Sarr is a photographer and visual artist who focuses on cultural identity and the specificities and complexities within different nations in her work. Sarr is interested in African fashion trends and the surrounding connotations. Through an emphasis on the historical, Sarr’s work focuses on cultural identity and the specificities and complexities within different nations in order to challenge unilateral views. instagram
• Canaan Brown uses creative writing, moving image, and music to explore parallel pasts and speculative futures. Brown reframes cultural excellence in society Through his creative practice, Brown seeks to reframe cultural excellence in society in order to mobilise more equitable societal consciousness. website | instagram
• Chrysa Kanari (b. 2002) is a Cypriot painter currently based in London. Her painting practice explores the aesthetics of human atrocity. She paint stories of pain that confront the viewer with the rotten and criminal aspect of the human condition – war, crime, murder. She uses painting as an investigative tool to create a space for a reinvestigation and renegotiation of history and memory. Through the unconventional use of colour, dramatic use of light and dynamic gesture, her aim is to create powerful scenes that captivate the viewer in a contemplation of pain and to showcase the expressive capacity of paint to convey the intensity of human emotion. website | instagram
• Emily Alice Mitchell is a multidisciplinary artist working with moving image, photography and sculpture. Exploring documentation as preservation, states of in-betweenness, and the utility of the archival in reconstructing histories, she navigates the liminality of mixedness and the in-betweens of British and Caribbean identities. In dialogue with grief, loss and trans-generational trauma, Mitchell seeks to challenge colonial ways of archiving and preserving shared histories. Viewing time as non-linear as a result of this trauma, inherited objects and found photographs are laid beside the artist’s own documentation of her ancestral landscapes. instagram
• Gugan Gill is a multimedia artist working across deeply personalised cultures. In using her Grandfather’s Super8 camera and pre-digital processes to create her films, Gill creates a portal for individual and cultural reflection on journeys taken. By tracking the etymology of ‘diaspora’ as a literal ‘scattering’, Gill situates her own family in both past and present. They exist today in contemporary Punjab and Birmingham whilst also existing in the traditions and skills they practised in colonial-era India and earlier. She contextualises these experiences as the scattering of seeds, the routes taken and roots grown, and the care of the plant in its new location. instagram
• KV Duong is an ethnically Chinese artist with a transnational background—born in Vietnam, raised in Canada, and now living as a queer person in Britain. He examines the complexities of Vietnamese queer identity, migration, and cultural assimilation through personal and familial history. During his MA studies at the Royal College, he is creating works on latex, highlighting its historical connection to French colonial rubber plantations in Vietnam while simultaneously embracing its sensuality and symbolic association with the queer experience. The recurring motif of a door or portal signifies access and the limitations imposed by societal constructs, particularly those associated with colonial and LGBTQ+ history. website | instagram
• Lujane Pagganwala’s practice is best expressed by the artist as an investigation of the phenomenology of space: ‘In the creation and the study of space, I have come to embrace its magnitude. Such that cannot be comprehended in a single study. My ultimate aim is to demonstrate three levels of space within my work; physical, experienced and imagined space’. The complex nature of these concepts impel the artist to regress back to childhood, revisiting the first and most rudimentary form of spaces/structures/towers they knew: ‘the spaces I create are invariably and inevitably also inspired by my city’s (Karachi) architecture. My spaces are a hybrid between childhood and the city.’ Asking, ‘What space do we occupy before our brain conceives a response to a visual? What do our eyes see?’ the artist calls these ‘flash spaces,’ exploring this phenomenon through installation pieces, videography, soundscapes, and performance. instagram
• Maria Helena Toscano is a conceptual artist and multidisciplinary award-winner designer from Venezuela and Colombia, based in Berlin & London. As a contemporary artist, she aims to challenge existing models and ideas around citizenship, identity, borders, privilege, and restrictions. Using various mediums, such as video, performance, installation, sound, sculpture, and mixed media, her work questions the impact of border policies and highlights the interconnectedness of people and cultures. Her work is informed by the theoretical framework of decolonial thinking, she draws inspiration from ideas such as Carl Jung’s concepts of “the spirit of the times and the spirits of the depths,” as well as Mestiza double consciousness from Gloria Anzaldúa. As an immigrant, she relates to multiple cultures and rejects assimilation in favor of hybridization. Her projects emphasize experimental processes that are activated and deeply influenced by certain sites. She uses art as a healing mechanism. website | instagram
• Ume Dahlia is a Mexican-Chilean artist based in London. Her practice focuses on encounters that are interwoven in different cultural identities. From a sensibility and interest in psychology, anthropology and mysticism, she gathers material and symbolic cultural content to elaborate on her practice. Through standing on Latin-American ecofeminist grounds, the artist addresses issues related to gender and cultural trauma and its reparations. instagram
• Mariana Sánchez Hernández is a Mexican-born, New York-based artist who is currently completing an MA in Painting at the Royal College of Art, London. With a background in architecture, Mariana’s work spans different kinds of media, including painting, stage design, and ceramics. Her exploration in painting is a practice that is shifting and evolving, whose marks live in the liminal space between representation and abstraction and deal with the reference of the media itself. Her compositions appear through a spontaneous technique that brings to life complex narratives that explore tragedy and joy, the ambiguities and contradictions of human nature. Domestic scenes, intimate self-reflections, the feminine and motherhood are subjects that appear constantly in her work. website | instagram
• Muhammad Muhammad is an artist living and working in London. Muhammad’s multidisciplinary practice of performance, film, sculpture and installation revolves around experimenting with feelings and dystopian narratives to reimagine the possibilities of change in the cosmic mess he inhabits. Inspired by his personal life and childhood, uncovering marginalised voices and forcing the audience to acknowledge the inextricable connection between the individual and the collective is central to his practice. The artist finds ways of adapting dystopian fragmented narratives where the absurd and/or the tragic happen to connect individual existence and collective humanity, reflecting on impermanence and the shared conditions that bind us. instagram
• Ningyue Qian (钱宁越) lives and works in London, graduated with first-class honours in sculpture from Shanghai University College of Fine Arts as an undergraduate, and is currently studying MA sculpture 23-24 at the Royal College of Art. “Cooking is always with me, which gives me an unfamiliar sense of relief.” As a Chinese expatriate living in London, Ningyue’s feelings of difference brought about by geographic shuttling have reshaped her fundamental understanding of the concepts of body, identity and nation. With regard to the initial questions raised by the geographical location of the body, Ningyue turns her attention to the cooking culture and the absorption process of oesophageal digestion in her hometown of Ningbo, China. The body serves as the driving force, the affects of appeasement are kneaded and baked into the dough. The affects of the unconscious habitus gradually expand, calcify, fragment and flow at will, and Ningyue uses dough as a medium to provoke reflection on the body’s suspension in power relations. website | instagram
• Leopoldo Alejandro Farrera Cuevas is a visual artist and filmmaker. He specializes in constructed photography by deconstructing symbolisms and semiotics, with themes around the psyche, loss of grief, the relationship we have with memory and our past, and, lately, inquiries regarding biopolitical themes in society. Currently based in London, he continues to explore these complex themes in his latest projects, focusing on how societal structures impact individual and collectiveness and the effects of the culture industry through a biopolitical lens. Co-founder of the LUX-19 film festival, Farrera Cuevas has exhibited his work at major venues, including the National Center for the Arts, Tate Modern, and the Malta Biennale 2024. His photobook “In Search of Absences” is part of the Kassel Dummy Award selection, and he has been nominated as Photographer of the Year 2024 by the London Camera Exchange. His work has been shown in Mexico, the UK, Chile, Malta, Spain, Japan, China, and Australia. He holds a degree in Visual Arts with honors from “ENPEG- La Esmeralda” and has studied at the Old Academy of San Carlos (FAD- UNAM) and Universidad Iberoamericana. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in photography at the Royal College of Art in London. website | instagram
• Rita Fernández‘s work is an exploration of self-portraiture and its limits. Through the dissection of personal experiences and striking images gathered from memories, dreams and daily life, her work is a constant inquiry about the self and what constitutes an identity. Her philosophical formation plays an important role in the way she conceives and approaches the creation of her artwork. website | instagram
• Shruti Gaonkar is an artist and practising architect who has worked and studied on three continents. She explores ‘wandering’ as a series of movements in time, place and culture when considering themes of post-colonial feminism and ecocide. Placing herself as a neuro-diverse woman of colour in a toxic patriarchal society, she responds to sharp increases in gendered violence, harassment, abuse and discrimination experienced in contemporary India. Shruti is currently completing an MA in Contemporary Art Practice at the Royal College of Art in London. instagram
• Weiyue Sun is a photographer based in London and China. She has a background in sociology and currently undertaking an MA in Photography at the Royal College of Art in London. Raised in the historically rich city of Xi’an and having spent significant time in Western countries, Sun is fascinated by the interplay between the colonial histories of East and West. Her practice explores the relationship between dominant histories and personal narratives and seeks to create multifaced interpretations of the past and present through photography. She reacts to obscured histories through multiple mediums and uses museums, archives, and collections as a legacy to retell and reinvent colonial history. website | instagram
• Weng-Io Wong‘s practice primarily revolves around exploring the relationship and mutual influence between individuals and technology. In recent works, she has delved into utilizing personal and historical memories, tracing family recollections, and uncovering the connections between local history, culture, and collective memory. After earning a BA in Fine Arts with First Class Honour at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Melbourne in 2015, Weng-Io Wong graduated from the Royal College of Art in London with an MA in Sculpture. website | instagram
• Yicai Pan is an artist based in London, currently studying for an MA in Sculpture at the Royal College of Art. She views art mediums as an integral part of her personal worldview. Through moving images, sculptures, and paintings, she responses to contemporary world issues from a post-human perspective. She often employs fictional narratives to discuss the boundaries between virtual and real, known and unknown. website | instagram
• Yucen Liu embarks on a conceptual exploration of how body diagrams and power dynamics are constructed, in our reality, shaped by a society of discipline where the dominance of power pressures us all to conform. Through installation art, she investigates how artwork interacts with spaces to evoke perceptions and emotions, merging artistic expression with spatial context. Yucen believes understanding the body’s perception is key to unraveling these complexities. instagram
• Yujin Son is a visual artist. Through her own way, using unconventional materials and weaving current issues and stories into art, builds bridges that guide to new horizons and perspectives. She expresses a self and reality that is deeply intertwined with society. To illuminate the essence of contemporaneity, she traces and gathers objects as evidence of issues surrounding her. This becomes a form of record, a path to gradual, meaningful change in our lives. By reversing and reconfiguring the materiality of substances collected from real spaces, she questions the values and subjectivity of our lives in an atypical manner. website | instagram

Photo credits: Carlo Zambon

Introduced on Hypha Studios Website