— “for those of us who live at the shoreline”(Audre Lorde, A Litany for Survival)
huiyin zhou + Laura Dudu
“辫（biān）” means to braid. “彼岸（bǐ àn）” literally translates as “the shore across,” but in Buddhism it also means another world — one reached through transcendence. The two words share the same syllables in Chinese, but differ in tone and meaning. The latter almost inhales a pause — in between — like the crossing itself: the shore, the arrival/ departure, the liminal space. That moment of transcendental suspension, like a plane pausing briefly on the runway between landing and takeoff. Both wor(l)ds gesture toward transformation through encounters. Like the act of grafting in agriculture, this exhibition, rather than telling, wants to meet.
Through photography, family archives, ephemera, writing, collage, installation, and participatory art, 辫（biān) /彼岸（bǐ àn）embraces both the artists and their works as at once the shore and the water. The standing shores — individual legacies of (im)migration and wars their families endured — are braided by tender waters: the intimacy and care they share as collaborators and chosen family.
Here, the boundary between land and water is not fixed. The shoreline is never static nor linear, but cared with fluidity: wave, water, crossing, merging. When we look closely, it touches our feet — tickling, grounding. When we gaze from afar, it becomes the horizon. A space of transcendence. Of becoming.
On View: August 1 - September 28, 2025, Gallery One, Artspace
Exhibition Page https://artspacenc.org/shorelines/
This project was supported, in part, by a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant.
Related Programming
First Friday + Exhibition Opening – FRI August 4, 4-10pm, free
Artist Tour – SAT August 30, 1-3pm, free
First Friday – FRI September 5, 4-10pm, free
Threading Memories: Text & Image as Creative Archiving – SAT September 20, 1-4pm (ticketed)
Artist Talk + Closing Reception – SAT September 27, 4-7pm, free
Gallery Guide (designed by huiyin & Laura) here.
Exhibition Pamphlet (designed by Artspace) here.
Installation views
Artworks included
1
i look at my body and then i see u (2025)
huiyin zhou & Laura Dudu
collage, installation, polaroid, printed photography (various sizes), wooden frame, nail
a contemplation on intimate bod(ies) and the layered act of seeing: to see, to be seen, to be taken, to be taken in, to witness, to be. what does it mean to photograph someone? what emerges when we put these images on display – blurrying the boundaries of living and performance, of what is shown and what refuses to be seen?
created during the artists’ travels in Bangkok, Thailand and Dongguan, China (2024–2025), this work searches for intimate murmurs of trust, friendship, and vulnerability amidst constant movement and geopolitical uncertainty.
2
biān 边 frame / border (2025)
huiyin zhou & laura dudu
collage, installation, wooden frame, nail, printed photography (various sizes)
biān 边 in Chinese can denote a border, a frame, an edge.
it speaks to a life lived across borders—nations, shorelines, thresholds. 边 breathes with gravity: the pull of departure, the ache of leaving, and the yearning for intimacy. the frame, no longer a boundary of separation, now floats — becoming a symbol of buoyancy, bubbling with dreamlike encounters that emerge in transitional spaces – of sky, water, and our bodies. looking from blurry edges of home, 边 invites dialogue with what can be captured and what might escapes the frame of memory.
3
féng 逢/缝 be-twined (2023)
huiyin zhou & laura dudu & CAO Collective
scans of hand-painted 16mm films, 12 x 16 in frames
féng means to encounter. 缝 féng means to stitch. created in 2023 through a workshop led by Laura and huiyin, joined by three Asian diasporic queer feminists and community friends. the process began with a guided somatic breathing exercise on healing. from there, the group entered the space to explore the homes we have lost and are contuining to build; grief, encounter, and the many stages of loss.
each participant worked on one section of the film, using 16mm frames (the size of a pinky nail, 0.404 in × 0.295 in), later enlarged 40 times. the final work reveals intricate details—five distinct sets of strokes and writings—each carrying the mark of a different hand, a different grief.
4 tiny garden; 5 tendering water
from waipo’s hands (learning to love my grandmother) series (2025)
huiyin zhou
6
回 huí / return (2025)
huiyin zhou & laura dudu
回(huí) means “to return.” The work uncarves the chinese characters using a photo and a matting board taken from a photo frame.
the character is composed of two rectangles – 口 – two mouths, two homes, yet also a maze with no clear entry or exit. huiyin and Laura wrote across the matting board of a frame, beginning from opposite ends to meet each other’s words in an act of encounter. inside, a photograph shows a hand hovering just above the surface of the water—taken beside a Buddhist temple (Longmen Grottoes) in Luoyang, China, now weathered by war and natural decay.
the hand reaches toward the reflection of a world we believed to be real. the water’s surface—a version of perceived-reality, also a mirage of a dream—ponders: is home still home upon return?
For Laura’s works & publications on shelves, please refer to Gallery Guide (designed by huiyin & Laura) here.
poster designed by yanki kung