Yang Mushi, The Art of Tension

What happens when sculpture stops being an object and becomes a system? In Yang Mushi’s work, metal seems to hold an invisible conflict: rigorously welded structures, sharply defined surfaces, fragments interlocked with almost industrial precision yet slightly out of alignment, as if the material itself resisted order. At Galerie Urs Meile, the exhibition Crisscross transforms the gallery’s neutral white space into a field of forces where geometry, recycled materials, and participatory installations question the relationship between social discipline and individual freedom. The sculptures are born from thousands of metal fragments salvaged from buildings, construction sites, and city streets. Yang dismantles them, recomposes them, and welds them into structures that appear stable yet vibrate with a latent instability. It is a powerful metaphor for contemporary life, where the frameworks that organize society - institutions, labor, urban architectures - shape bodies and behaviors, but never fully erase individuality. In some works, language itself becomes material. Slogans drawn from Chinese internet culture are transformed into metallic objects that occupy space with almost aggressive irony, evoking the competitive pressure and generational anxiety that run through contemporary society. Elsewhere, art becomes a game - or rather, a physical test. In Ping Pong – Beijing Moment, visitors are invited to play table tennis on their knees against an unusually high steel net while a digital clock runs backward: an impossible match that turns sport into an allegory of the invisible rules governing social life. In Yang Mushi’s world, order is never final. It is a fragile structure, constantly tested by the energy of those who inhabit it.