Ashes In Your Eyes

We are very pleased to announce Ashes in Your Eyes, a solo exhibition by Jun Rui Lo, the first show of our 2025 programme at Haarlem Artspace. Approaching art as an emotional response, Jun Rui Lo’s work explores identity politics and the aesthetics of ambiguity. As a non-binary individual from Hong Kong living and working in the United Kingdom, the interrogation of queer and diasporic identity forms the foundation of Lo’s practice. Influenced by queer theory which advocates for gender and sexual non-conformity and freedom from normative tendencies, their work pursues the fluidity of identity and attempts to give tangibility to feelings of melancholy, alienation, and rootlessness. Lo’s practice revolves around emotionally charged drawings and sculptures. Employing flowing lines and forms animated by the freedom of identity fluidity, their work simultaneously bears a sentimental undertone derived from deeply personal pain and struggle. With a practice rooted in expanded drawing and inspired by notions of material culture and object biography, Lo’s work uses everyday objects, books, keys, shoes and chairs, particularly accentuating their traces of usage and cultural connotations. Through exploring, transforming, and juxtaposing these found materials, Lo aims to construct allegorical narratives and scenes rooted in the emotional connections between them and humans. Lo’s presentations are often described as elegant, subtle, and ambiguous. Lo emphasises the gaps between meanings and aims to focus on the sublime. While their representations are never explicit, the ambiguity and subtlety in the works seek to amplify their impact.