"Serendipity" Yuyu Zhitong

Serendipity marks Yuyu Zhitong’s debut solo exhibition in Dubai and the Middle East, presenting a new body of paintings developed through an intuitive yet disciplined approach to abstraction. The exhibition examines the intersection of chance and structure, where perception emerges through a continuous process of construction, disruption, and reconfiguration.

Zhitong’s practice is grounded in a method that rejects preparatory sketches in favor of direct engagement with the canvas. Painting unfolds as an accumulative process, guided by intuition informed by experience. Images are repeatedly deconstructed and rebuilt until a sense of internal coherence is achieved. Meaning arises not through predetermined narratives, but through attentive recognition of unexpected relationships within form, color, and movement. The artist’s background in Chinese dance informs the physicality of her work. Gesture operates as a central compositional element, imparting rhythm and tension across the pictorial surface. Color functions structurally rather than descriptively, with recurring tones of ultramarine, magenta, crimson, and violet generating spatial depth and emotional resonance. Abstract and figurative elements coexist, allowing images to oscillate between memory, sensation, and perception.

Throughout the exhibition, Zhitong addresses themes of identity, transition, intimacy, and lived experience. Landscapes, figures, and interior states intersect without hierarchy, producing compositions that resist fixed interpretation. The works invite sustained viewing, encouraging the viewer to engage with painting as a temporal and perceptual experience rather than a resolved image. The title Serendipity refers to the capacity to recognize significance within chance encounters. For Zhitong, this concept defines both her process and her understanding of painting. Each work represents a moment in which trained intuition encounters uncertainty, allowing form and meaning to emerge through attentive observation rather than control.

This exhibition marks an important milestone in the artist’s international trajectory and introduces her practice to audiences in the Middle East, situating her work within broader contemporary dialogues around abstraction, intuition, and the continued relevance of painting as a site of inquiry.

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