Ruihan Wang

Artist: VASS, Matthew Wang, Shihui Lv

Curator:Ruihan Wang

Relations can produce connection, but they can equally expose difference and discomfort.

‘Shared Heat’ explores how relationships emerge through bodily proximity, shared environments, and moments of encounter. Developed through ongoing research into bodily experience, intimacy, and public space, the project evolved from earlier research on the public bathhouse.

In the public bathhouse, strangers shared the same environment, where heat, steam, and physical proximity shaped subtle forms of interaction. Within this shared space, people relied on unspoken conventions to maintain privacy, trust, and care. These everyday dynamics inform the curatorial approach of Shared Heat, which considers the exhibition as a temporary ‘social buffer’—a space where encounters can unfold while allowing room for individual boundaries and shared experience.

The exhibition brings together works by three artists whose practices engage with the body from distinct perspectives. Alongside the artworks, two workshops invite visitors to extend these encounters through participation. One is a therapeutic painting session that encourages reflection through colour and gesture. The other unfolds through anonymous writing, with each participant responding to the previous contribution, allowing connections to develop across time without direct interaction. The texts and drawings produced during the workshops will be compiled into a physical zine and made available online through a digital archive.

Drawing on relational aesthetics, ‘Shared Heat’ approaches the exhibition as a space where encounters become part of the work. At the same time, it asks how these encounters are shaped, supported, and cared for. Moments of connection exist alongside distance and difference. The exhibition invites visitors to reflect on how temporary communities take shape and how spaces of care are continually formed.