The Grand Tour · 2026 China Academy of Art (CAA) Graduation Season has come to a successful close. Graduates from 20 academic units responded to the times with art and explored the future through creativity, unfolding a youthful narrative of ideals, journeys, and growth across the city and campus, transforming Hangzhou into an open art venue that gathers intellectual power, creativity, and action.

The China Academy of Art is proud to launch the "Youth Insights" series, which continues to focus on topics such as avant-garde experimentation, humanities and technology, rural academies, A better China, rooted construction, people-centered, poetic cinema, visual sinology, Eastern design, and overseas insights. The series closely follows how young creators measure the world with their footsteps and respond to the times with their works. Between every departure and arrival, we jointly witness the grand explorations and boundless possibilities of a new generation of artists.

Summoned by the deep call of civilizational roots and shaped by the dynamic currents of global visuality, the paintings of "visual sinology" range from the cosmological vision of "heaven and humanity as one" in landscape scrolls to the seasonal whispers of flora's cycles in watermarked woodblock prints. Though working across different media, the creators share a common commitment to "bearing witness through images and conveying the Way through art." Whether through the refined brushwork on rice paper that carries the spirit of literati tradition, or the woodblock explorations that preserve cultural heritage, both paths trace the deep grammar of Chinese visual experience. Within a global historical framework, these works are not mere replicas of tradition, but experimental reconstructions—where brush and knife converge—to forge a "visual atlas" that spans scroll and print, uniting the cultivation of the mind with the mastery of craft.

Remnants of the Past

Fang Yan

College/School:

School of Painting

Supervisors:

Shao Beiyan, Cao Xingjun, Zhang Xiaofeng

Medium: 

Monotype Printmaking

Artist Statement

War and upheaval, nature and human intervention—countless antiquities have already dissolved into the passage of time. The theme of my work centers on lost cultural relics. Rendered in a black-and-white palette, it presents both their past and present states, seeking to convey a sense of helplessness and grief over their disappearance, as a way of mourning the once-brilliant remnants of civilization, while also lamenting the quiet fading of these historical treasures. These sixty-two artworks carry my remembrance of bygone antiquities and my reflections on the preservation and safeguarding of historical heritage. I also hope to call upon the public to cherish the treasures that still remain with us today, so that no more historical imprints fade from memory.

Advisor's Message

Fang Yan's graduation work, themed around "lost cultural relics," employs the monotype printmaking technique to depict the past and present states of China's splendid civilizational remnants. Composed of sixty-two black-and-white images of varying sizes arranged into a three-by-five-meter matrix, it weaves a silent elegy for civilization.

At the same time, the work achieves a breakthrough in technical expression. The artist harnesses the serendipity and experimental nature of monotype printmaking, turning each piece into a miniature laboratory of technique. This innovation—deconstructing and recombining traditional printmaking language—endows the black-and-white images with a tactile density, while also embodying a young artist's profound inquiry into the survival of civilization.

Fang Yan

- Born in Fuzhou, Fujian, 2001

- 2019–2023: Bachelor's degree, China Academy of Art

- 2023–2026: Master's degree, China Academy of Art

Exhibitions:

- 2025 — Selected for "Engraving Impressions: The 1st Youth Printmaking Biennale"

- 2025 — Selected for "The Earth Sings: 20 Years of Zhejiang's Practice of the 'Lucid Waters and Lush Mountains Are Invaluable Assets' Concept" Art Exhibition

- 2024 — Selected for the China Academy of Art × Musashino Art University Faculty and Student Printmaking Exhibition