Sep 11, 2024

Jinny Yu and quantum physics

Catch Jinny Yu live in conversation at the AGO with physicist Shohini Ghose and art historian Ming Tiampo

An image of Jinny Yu's Inextricably Ours 23-08. It features geometric squares in various shades of red and orange

Jinny Yu. Inextricably Ours 23-08, 2023. Oil on aluminum, 152.4 × 139.7 cm. Courtesy of the artist. © Jinny Yu. Photo: Rémi Thériault

On view now at the AGO, the exhibition Jinny Yu: at once features 22 new works, including paintings with oil on aluminum and works on paper, from Yu’s ongoing series Inextricably Ours. Described by the artist as “wonky cuboids,”these works present viewers with a fascinating geometric illusion, forcing them to reflect on whether they see flat ground, three-dimensional figures, or both. Curated by Georgiana Uhlyarik, Fredrik S. Eaton Curator of Canadian Art at the AGO, the unique visual experience of At Once symbolizes Yu’s continued investigation into the guest/host dynamic of settler colonialism.

On Saturday, September 14, Yu will sit down with curator and art history professor Ming Tiampo and quantum physicist Shohini Ghose to discuss the surprising ways their fields of study overlap. In this conversation moderated by Uhlyarik, they will chat about relativity, perception, and how the work of an artist and a scientist can align. Ghose is a professor of physics and computer science, author, and award-winning speaker with a TED Talk on quantum computing that has drawn five million views. Tiampo is an art history professor, curator, and co-director of the Centre for Transnational Cultural Analysis at Carleton University.

The event also marks the launch of a bilingual 120-page monographic publication on Yu’s work, featuring essays by Uhlyarik, Tiampo, Patrick Flores, and a foreword by Marie-Eve Beaupré. The book is available for purchase at shopAGO. 

“When the AGO asked who I’d like to engage in conversation with about my show, Shohini Ghose was the first person who came to mind,” explains Yu. “I’ve long admired her work, especially her insights into the connections between physics, abstraction, and identity politics. These ideas resonate deeply with my practice, and I’m eager to explore how painting and physics relate, whether in abstract or concrete forms, through the fundamental elements we both engage with in our respective work. I’m equally excited to finally meet her in person, alongside Ming Tiampo, a world-renowned curator and scholar, with whom I’ve been fortunate to engage in dialogue about my work and broader topics for over a decade.”

In her catalogue essay, Jinny Yu: In a World of Binaries, the Pluriverse, Tiampo reflects on Yu’s major works, highlighting how she boldly pushes the boundaries of artistic form as a means of exploring identity politics. “Yu’s paintings are not, however, pure form, but rather use an inquiry into form as a portal for conceptual and political reflection,” she writes. “Painting on cotton that moves on air currents like breath, glass that reveals the ground beneath like desire, and aluminum panels that appear and disappear like light, Yu is an artist who explores the thresholds of painting as a means of probing the borders that we construct in ourselves, in the ways that we organize the world, and in the conceptual frameworks we use to understand art, life, and politics.”

Don’t miss Jinny Yu, Shohini Ghose and Ming Tiampo in conversation live at the AGO on Saturday September 14. Tickets are available here. The new book JINNY YU: AT ONCE/À LA FOIS is available now at shopAGO.