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ArtEvol 2025 / Yuna Yu
There Is No New Thing Under the Sun , 2025 Watercolour on linen, old military parachute, rusty bells 230 × 200 cm
Yuna Yu is a London-based artist who has studied and lived in Toronto, Beijing and London. Yu’s practice explores self-mythology alongside cultural and historical decay within a contemporary framework. Early works investigated psychological experience through themes of blurred violence, provocative intimacy, nostalgic memory and cycles of self-destruction and reconstruction. Over time, the practice expanded to examine collective human experience in relation to mythology, decay, time and eternity.
Artwork Introduction There Is No New Thing Under the Sun is a tapestry-like painting in watercolour on linen, featuring an old military parachute sewn into the centre. Tapestries historically signify wealth, status, and prosperity, often depicting cultivated flowers, vegetables, and hunted animals. In this work, watercolour replicates the aged texture of a worn tapestry. The outer circle shows a cyclical pattern of grapes and tomatoes from growth to decay, reflecting life’s cyclical nature. The inner circle depicts tiny falling human figures that echo the parachute at the centre, conveying a state of resisting the fall, yet unable to defy death. The work transforms historical tragedy and the repetition of fate into an ornamental object, critically engaging with cultural decay and the flattening of artefacts removed from their original context.
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