Born in Hangzhou, China, and now based in Germany, Shan Fan has long worked across the aesthetic traditions of East and West—expanding ink beyond its role as a traditional painting medium into a conceptual and philosophical language. For him, ink is not just a tool for representation, but a means of thinking through time, memory, and the traces of existence.

In this Biennale, Shan Fan presents Entropy – Ink-Stained Life Cannot Be Bleached Clean, a work that consists of a video performance and a physical silk gown.

The title itself is a striking declaration: no matter how much you try to bleach it, an ink-stained life will not turn white.
It speaks to a way of being that accepts the stains of life—its traces, its mess, its unerasable memories.

In the performance, the artist pours ink over a white gown, then pours water over it in a ritual-like gesture. The act is not one of purification, but one of confrontation: the ink does not fully wash away.
It remains—marking time, memory, and the body with quiet persistence.

Displayed beside the video is the stained silk gown itself—a body absent, but a trace vividly present. It becomes a ghostly residue of existence, a testament to what lingers even after the self has disappeared.

Rather than seeking to erase, cleanse, or perfect, Shan Fan invites us to carry and hold our traces—to reflect on civilization and life not through purity, but through what remains.

Aligned with the Biennale’s theme, Neighbors of Civilization, this work does not reject tradition, but poses new questions atop its stains.

As you stand before Entropy,
ask yourself:
What is it that refuses to disappear?
What do your own stains remember?