What do seashells have to do with collective human history? The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) answers this question and invites you to reflect on it at their most recent exhibition “Disentangling Entanglement: In Memory of Intimacy, Vulnerability, and Action,” on view from February 26 to May 23. The art pieces portray how we “come together, collaborate, part ways, and continue moving forward.” This is a vital space for our community to learn about different angles of human experiences and how we can appreciate these emotions through art as a result of research.

The exhibition navigates a common yet unfixed feeling: mourning. Mourning life journeys left behind, mourning people we waved goodbye without knowing it would be the last time, and mourning unanswered questions that were never asked… These evoked feelings are the main drive behind the ICA’s artists. The artists based their projects on personal and mundane experiences, creating an alluring collection of unique remembrances.

At the center of the exhibition you will find a seashell-shaped dome named “From Heteroglossia to Monologue,” envisioned by Zhu Lina. The dome holds a delicate yet provoking embroiderment on the inside, where you can appreciate colorful stitches, representing the fingerprints of the artists’ fellow activists. In the creation of this artpiece, Zhu Lina reflected on her journey: beginning as a journalist involved in different media and social issues, she navigated life in Guangzhou, Beijing, Kunshan and Shanghai, where she encountered many special yet finite interactions, interactions that would not last forever. The artist reflects on her own history and created a space for remembrance of all of those individuals she mourns. She said, “Many adventures feel like dreams. Many people I have never seen again. I think we are all caught in the surging tide of history.” The dome invites the audience to reflect on their own lives, leaving an impactful message with a sentiment of retrospection. The white dome represents a seashell and the inner colorful embroidery represents fingerprints; just like the dome, we humans hold the collection of faces and stories we once encountered.

Ji Chenjia, a Doctor of Sociology from Kyoto University and leading curator at the ICA, explained that this research exhibition approaches the word “community” as, “a process in which both its members and their status are constantly shifting.” The exhibition challenges traditional ways of viewing community on fixed values such as solidarity, but observes community like a body prone to dispersal. Dispersal as a result of an organic phase of life, such as fermentation, “we have come to feel more at ease with dispersion as a natural process, one that is often brought about by rapid social change or shifts in life circumstances.” This reflection invites the audience to a space for appreciating other’s vulnerability and considering our own instances of mourning.

More pieces – “Echoes Woven in Lament” by Zhao Yiren, “Where Things Unfold in Layers” by Xiaoka, “Diary in the Dark Room” by Luozha, “A Door without Inside” by Zhao Ko, and “Eye of Haizhu” by Zijin – echo the experiences of artists who reflect on their activism, their time at non-profits, migrant labor in China, trauma, and gender justice. These pieces embody vulnerability and introspection, each a singular thread woven into the tapestry of collective experience, belonging, and mourning.

As part of the exhibition and in the echo of disentangling community experiences, the ICA created a “Space for Us” on the underground floor, where people can socialize together, learn embroidering, and share life experiences as a piece of the collective art-scene. This invites the audience not only to reflect about the past but also to create an intentional present.

When reflecting on how to amplify the ICA’s work to the broader community, Dr. Ji adds that “despite the common ideals shared by members of a community, the relationships among them remain inherently complex. With its full emotional weight, the exhibition seeks to bring these interpersonal entanglements into view before they fade away.”

Like how seashells echo the sound of the sea, we humans echo the sound of the collective past from where we come from. Come and experience what the Institute of Contemporary Arts at NYU Shanghai has to offer.