217 Strangers, Hao Xu

217 Strangers Hao Xu
Curated by 15Curators Collective

15Curators are delighted to announce, as part of the Chinese Visual Festival, the forthcoming exhibition of Chinese photographer, Hao Xu. The exhibition explores the sentiment of being a "stranger", along with the notion of identity within a globalised world. The selected works reflect the artist’s heritage and the impact of living in a new country; his search for meaning and identity where details of everyday life are strange and confusing.

The video Neverland is a story of a man leaving his home - both physically and emotionally. It demonstrates that despite differences of ethnicity, feelings of homesickness and lost childhood are universal. The viewer is encouraged to explore the connections between people and places; the idea of "belonging" somewhere.

217 Strangers in My Family Album 1962-1986 is a work in which faces found in group portraits belonging to the artist's grandfather, have been isolated and enlarged. This process draws attention to the behaviour of the individual within a group and reflects Chinese society at moments between 1962 and 1986 - the faces, dress code and expressions - a contrast with today's modern China. In Mutual, Hao Xu takes his own group portraits and subjects them to the same process of isolating the individuals, which gives us a brief glimpse into collective behavioural idiosyncrasies within the contemporary Russian context.

Hao Xu (b. 1987) is an MFA Photography practitioner from the University for the Creative Arts. Primarily based in London, he has participated in artist residencies in both Russia and India, has been included in art fairs and gallery group shows in the UK, Russia, China and Estonia and had a solo exhibition at Central Saint Martins earlier this year.

15Curators is a curatorial collective of students that completed the Introduction to Curating course at Central Saint Martins in Spring 2014. With a diverse range of nationalities represented, including Spain, Finland, Italy, China and the UK, 15Curators looks for opportunities to create events and exhibitions that explore themes of understanding and adjusting to cultural diversity in a globalised society.