Jinya Zhao: Holding Air, Holding Light explores the sculptural and perceptual work of artist and researcher Jinya Zhao. Combining her signature use of blown glass with drawing, installation and spatial choreography, Zhao’s works inhabit a liminal space – between fragility and presence, memory and light, visibility and sensation. Rather than present objects as finished forms, Zhao creates conditions for perception. Her works shift under natural light, respond to atmosphere and dissolve the distinction between seeing and feeling. Using transparency, layering and spatial tension, she invites viewers to pause and inhabit a moment of perceptual suspension. As she writes: ‘Glass is not what I make, but how I listen to time.’ By integrating theory and practice, Zhao constructs immersive encounters that heighten sensory awareness, transforming glass into an artistic language that connects memory, perception and experience.
