Naked Beyond skin is a touring project that brings forth an array of new sculptural creations by Shanghai-based female artist Xiang Jing. Having attained critical success in Hong Kong in April, followed by Bangkok in May, the exhibition has finally made its way back to China with new additional artworks for the last leg in Beijing.

Graduating with a sculpture degree from the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing, Xiang Jing first caught the Chinese Art world’s notice with the solo project, Keep in Silence, in 2005, Xiang revealed a tour-de-force assemblage of diverse figurative representations that astounded many critics, collectors and viewers, both in its craftsmanship and its clear, singular approach that eschewed much of the trendiness found in contemporary Chinese art today.

The sculptures were dramatic, some replete with iconic references that appeared to have been culled straight from reality while others were like comic-book characters, with the entire project made all the more profound by presenting only figures of women. There is also a power in the way she assembles the pieces, evocatively expanding the sculptural possibilities of the viewers’ relationship to the work; especially in regard to the angularity between the bodies’ scale, dimension, texture and color.

In most cases, the BODY is the technology at the core of ‘sculpture’. It articulates the dynamism of the art, as well as our shifting responses to it. In the last few years, our understanding of the human body has transcended anything imaginable only decades earlier. Now, the possibilities of transforming, splicing, cloning, and the complete manipulation of the genetic material, are within reach. Naturally, these new properties of the body have influenced the development of art.

This spirit of the body lives on - at least, according to Xiang Jing, for this is what is embedded in her new body of sculptures presented in this new exhibition. The artist is acutely sensitive to matter – and utterly physical when manipulating it. She has created these sculptures hiding nothing and revealing only nakedness from head to feet. Such processing challenges her body and mind, her inner and outer strength all at the same time, and it is this dynamic that is embodied in these sculptures.

It as if all the artworks as bound together as one entity, coupled with the idea of creating a complex haptic geometry; a crisscrossing of representational connections that parallel the raw emotional sentiment inherent in this series. The space of presentation between these sculptures and the exhibition space also play an important role in this project .

Overall, the sculptures do not exactly express a social critique of urbanization, nor an attempt to immerse the viewer in a spatial journey with formal delineations. They are perhaps just quiet, personal narratives the artist hopes to share with her viewers. Taken together, these energetic pieces, in all their naked glory, surely enhance Xiang Jing’s status as one of the finest contemporary sculptors in China today.