ARTIST BIO: LONG Pan
Long Pan (born 1991 in Yichun, China. Lives and works in Jiangxi, China) graduated from the Intermedia Department of China Academy of Art in 2019 with a master's degree. Currently living in Jiangxi, her recent work has often happened in China's southwestern and northwestern regions. Her works are based on field visits to different sites and collaborations with biological media in laboratories. Fungi and plants are her main research subjects; she has used biotechnologies such as “Phytometallurgy,” “Fungal Degradation,” and “Plant Glazing” to make visible the invisible alienation in the environment. Her research focuses on interpreting the deeper and often overlooked relationships between humanity’s survival and the environment within contemporary industrial society from a non-human perspective, aiming to explore and reveal the “hidden correspondence” within the entire web of life humans inhabit. In recent years, her long-term projects include: “Mountain deities for sale” which explores the entangled relationship between minerals in the Mountains and undergrowth species (2022–); and “Leaves,” utilizing glazing techniques to use plants as environmental indicators (2022–).
In 2022, Long Pan received the Prince Claus Fund Mentor Award for Cultural & Artistic Responses to Environmental Change and was selected for the Beijing Contemporary Art Foundation’s Women Artists Award, sponsored by Christie’s. She has undertaken prestigious artist residencies at: Pro Helvetia Arts Council, Switzerland (2024);The Swatch Art Peace Hotel, Shanghai, China (2022); Emerging Curators Online Project, PSA Power Station of Art Shanghai, China (2021); V2 Summer Sessions & Points Art Center, Jiangsu, China (2020); Dwelling in Catastrophe, DAC Dimensions Art Center, Chongqing, China (2019 ); Design and Thinking, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China (2018). Her works are included in “Art and Ecological Impact: A Contemporary Artist’s Guide to Environmental Practice” (edited by Mary Mattingly, Yale University Press, 2027).
Her recent solo exhibition “Flux in Dust” was held at Chronus Art Center, Shanghai, China (2022). Selected recent group exhibitions include: Moscow Biennale of Environment (Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, 2025), Pulse Gravity (506 Gallery, Porto Alegre, Brazil, 2025), Signals of the Visible and Invisible (Radical Fungi, Ohio, USA, 2024); Pearl Art Museum, Shanghai, China (2023); SNAP Art Center, Shanghai, China (2023); Beijing Art Biennale, Beijing, China (2022); Mecalline Art Center, Beijing, China (2022); Wuhan Biennale, Wuhan Art Museum, Wuhan, China (2022); CGK Contemporary Gallery Kunming, Yunnan, China (2022); The 8th Duolun Youth Art Exhibition, Duolun Museum, Shanghai, China (2022); Chengdu Biennale, Tianfu Art Museum, Chengdu, China (2021); MCAM Art Museum, Shanghai, China (2021); OCT Art Center, Shenzhen, China (2020); Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial, Niigata, Japan (2020); Fosun Art Center, Shanghai, China (2019).
Wind Bell
2-channel video installation:
Extract (2021), HD video, colour, sound, 13:34
Wind Bell (2021), HD video, colour, sound, on loop
Long Pan’s Phytometallurgy Series, of which “Wind Bell” is a part, harnesses plants to extract and visualize heavy metals, translating microscopic contamination into tangible art, in a kind of aesthetic alchemy. The “Wind Bell” project involves extracting copper from polluted reeds in Guiyu, Guangdong Province, China – widely considered to be the world’s largest electronic waste site. Using phytomining technology (recycling metal from plants that accumulate metals), Long Pan melted the extracted copper into a ceremonial bell, reflecting on recovery and resilience. When the wind blows, the distinct metallic chime of the bell contrasts with the gentle rustling of reeds in the landscape – perhaps as a warning bell sounding an SOS for the environment. Bridging science and poetics, the creation of this wind bell is not only an illustration of alienation within the environment, but also an expression of the dramatically different scales of time of the seemingly indestructible mineral, and the vulnerable, much shorter scale of organic and human life. Long Pan shows us all too clearly the devastating impact that mankind has upon the very landscapes that sustain us. With heavy metals from pollution entering the food chain to such an extent that plants, animals and humans now absorb them, it is frightening to think what the landscapes of the future will look like.
