Fu Xiaotong's needlework on handmade paper on view at Chelsea gallery

Chambers Fine Art in Chelsea is currently presenting a collection of work by Fu Xiaotong for the show Land of Serenity.

For this show, Xiaotong unveils several new works on handmade Xuan paper that has been used within China since the Tang Dynasty (618-907) and include images of mountains, rocks, and water. Without making changes to the original quality of the Xuan paper, she illustrates the outlines for her subjects by piercing with a needle through the paper hundreds of thousands of times. She has titled each of her works in accordance with the number of pinpricks she poked in each one. Some of her works are large-scale pieces the at nearly cover the gallery walls while others are smaller-scale such as Pupil-380,000 Pinpricks featuring the image of the front of an eyeball occupying nearly the entire piece of paper with the pupil being the primary focal point as the title suggests.

Water, 328,440 Pinpricks by Fu Xiaotong

Xiaotong captures the true essence of her subject matter in every piece. With works like Water 328,440 Pinpricks or Water 322,000 Pinpricks, viewers can see and feel the swift movement of the wave in the center, while in images like 208,500 Pinpricks viewers can feel the calm stillness of the water. Intriguing characters can also be found in these works. For instance, Land of Serenity features a row of curved structures resembling hill or mountaintops, but at the end of the image, the head of a snake appears. Similarly, in 220,320 Pinpricks, human heads and a man and woman holding hands are integrated in the scene.

Fu Xiaotong was born in Shanxi and studied at the Tianjin Academy of Fine Arts in Tianjin, and the China Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. At Chambers Fine Art, 522 W. 19th St., through Mar. 26. The gallery is open Tues.—Sat. from 10 a.m.—6 p.m.