As It Turns Quiet, We Rot
8 - 14 August 2025
33ml Offspace, -1F No.4 RD. Zhaohua 518 Shanghai, China
Contact: info@lumka.com
LUmkA is pleased to present “As It Turns Quiet, We Rot,” a collaboration by Ruby Chen and Linx Peng on view from 8 to 14 August 2025 at 33ml Offspace, Shanghai, China.
“In the information age, an attitude of human evolution and refinement past our history books is disseminated. Genocides and land wars, a barbarism we agreed to outgrow, are live streamed to reveal the falsity of evolution.
Perhaps we never surpassed the medieval dark age.
Technofeudalism, as theorized by Yanis Varoufakis, parallels medieval feudalism to big tech’s control of the metaverse. We (the serfs) are bound to their platforms and offer the entirety of our digital information as currency. This process of data mining further instills the techno-oligarchs’ position.
Neophilia, a fetishistic obsession for the novel, drives a façade of technological breakthroughs and human advancements. These ‘inventions’ organize a masquerade of reform and evolution. With this attitude, the populace distances itself from our past as if to negate shame and honor for those persecuted. Such detachment prevents one from engaging with the root of the problem– our generational traumas and compulsions we need to unravel and unlearn.
Our collective dissociation and death drive propels the repetition of history.”
- Ruby Chen
Through sculpture and sound, Chen and Peng explore the performance of innovation and its inability to suppress primal impulses. In observing digital serfdom’s modernizing of dark age labor practices, the artists position a parallel between the convention of newness and corporate confinement. Entangling their practices, an organization of the animate and inanimate highlights the exploration of the subconscious as a means to unlearn perspectives instilled by the false structure of “human evolution.”
RUBY CHEN (b. 2001) is a multidisciplinary artist specializing in sculptures and paintings, whose works are inspired by ancient cultures and primal human compulsions. Fascinated by the contrast of human desires, and the societal structures in which they exist under, Chen inquires on the clashing yet coexisting impulses: the urge to break free of confinement and be reborn anew, versus the inevitability of repeating and fixating on the past. The artist’s works often incorporate humanoid materials such as skin-textured wax, tangled hair, and beating sounds, and are installed under a hyper- contextualized environment, reflecting Chen’s engagement with both the unconscious human psyche and socio-political theories.
Chen’s work has recently been exhibited by NADA, NYC, Komune, NYC, and Alexia Project, Shanghai, among others. The artist’s work has been reviewed by publications such as Elephant Art Magazine, IMPULSE Magazine, Mundane Magazine, and HAZZE Media, among others.
LINX PENG (b. 2002) is an artist, musician, and producer whose work spans deconstructed electronic music, art-pop, and experimental sound. She also serves as an art director for screen-based projects, working across sound, visual design, and physical performance. In 2025, LINX presented her live performance piece CARE at TANK, West Bund Art & Design, Shanghai. In this work, she fiercely, passionately, and sincerely explored sound design, artistic associations, and bodily expression, pushing the boundaries of perception and emotion.
As the founder and artistic director of the Alexia Project, a platform dedicated to practice-based and alternative perspectives in contemporary art, LINX curated its inaugural practice—exhibition “Don’t, Don’t Do It Again”, which opened near the Bund in late 2024. The project reflects her distinct approach to curation and interdisciplinary artistic practice. Currently, LINX continues to delve into bodily experience, sound design, and materiality, aiming to foster cross-media artistic exchange within subcultural communities.
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