The exhibition

Inspired by the daily life and personal feelings, young artist Li Nu has created more than 20 artworks ranging from installations and sculptures to videos for a new exhibition at the Today Art Museum in Beijing. The exhibition starts with the text installation: What's the Date Today, carved right on the museum's facade. 

According to Zhu Zhu, the exhibition's curator, the title As if Sand Were Stone comes from a poem Argentina poet and writer Jorge Luis Borges first published in 1969. The poem goes: "Nothing is built upon stone: for all is built upon sand: but let each man build as if sand were stone..." 

These lines were etched deep in Li's memory and now they have turned into an exhibition title with the aim of delivering the idea: each individual, even if they are like a grain of sand, should be a persisting stone.

Various materials like ice, lamb tallow, sound and scent have been used by the artist to signify indefinite conditions and relations and enable the meaning carried by the works. 

The exhibition is set to run until November 15.