Exhibition period: March 22 – June 21, 2026
Venue: Yuz Museum
About Exhibition
From March 22 to June 21, 2026, Yuz Museum is pleased to present a duo exhibition of Shanghai-based artists Liu Ren and Zhang Ruyi, titled “Everything is on time, only time was never ours.” Organized by the museum in close collaboration with the artists, the exhibition brings together nearly fifty works within a spatial framework jointly conceived by Liu and Zhang. The presentation traces the trajectories of their respective practices while allowing their shared visual aesthetics and emotional undertones to mirror one another, collectively forming an open field for observing how individuals respond to and reflect on their own existence within modern cities.
Both Liu and Zhang were born in Shanghai, where they grew up and continue to live and work. After graduating together from the Department of Printmaking at the Shanghai Academy of Fine Arts in 2007, they became partners in life, while also sharing a sustained commitment to art, each pursuing an independent artistic path over nearly two decades. Their works emerge from a shared lived environment, deeply rooted in everyday experience and perception. Each artist sensitively captures fragments and subtle textures of urban development, social systems, and historical events. Yet intriguingly, the similarity of their surroundings and the intimacy of their lives have not produced converging artistic styles. Instead, through years of mutual observation, they have cultivated markedly different material vocabularies and modes of expression.
At the core of Liu Ren’s practice lies material transformation and conceptual juxtaposition. He meticulously transcribes words onto the inner surfaces of eggshells, or inscribes symbols of grand historical narratives and poetic verses about time onto straw paper. He transforms fragile, inexpensive materials into vessels for conceptual meaning, creating narrative fields that are at once absurd, suspended, and poetic. The fragility of materials alludes to the vulnerability of individuals and the impermanence of life, yet they evoke historical achievements or humanity’s pursuit of permanence and value. This stark contrast shatters established symbolic meanings while provoking reflection on the relationship between the progress of civilization and individual destiny, as well as ultimate questions concerning faith, soul, and life and death.
Zhang Ruyi, by contrast, works with cacti, concrete, ceramic tiles, and other everyday materials to reveal the invisible structures in urban life where order and disorder coexist. She explores the inherent contradictions within these materials, stripping them of their original functional logic to construct a visual language that is austere and charged with tension. Through ingenious recombination and site-specific grafting, these materials become vessels for urban memory and mirrors of individual circumstance. Motifs such as grids, barriers, and blockages subtly evoke the compressed and solidified spaces of the city, while the cacti or their shed spines concealed within appear as fragile yet stubborn anchors through which individuals shaped by industrialization and modern systems affirm their existence and seek meaning in life.
A grid-shaped wooden framework, conceived jointly by the two artists, serves as the structural logic of the exhibition space. The structure symbolizes the precision and order of industrial production, while also suggesting a cage—a metaphor for individuals being swept away by massive systems and insatiable desires. Their works both respond to the external environments and systems symbolized by this overarching structure from a micro-level perspective, interconnected while retaining their own temporal rhythms and traces. Within the grid-reconstructed space, objects often overlooked or discarded by social systems and by their time are revived, transforming into warm narratives beneath cold institutions, or forms of untimely growth under uniform standards.
The exhibition title, “Everything is on time, only time was never ours.”, originated from an episode of “loss of control” experienced by Zhang Ruyi. When a work intended for the exhibition failed to arrive in time, she affixed this sentence onto the empty exhibition wall in response to the unexpected disruption, like a quiet sigh. The words convey both an understanding of overarching order and a lucid awareness of the individual’s predicament. Beneath its seemingly calm tone lies a profound sense of dissonance and inner rupture. The contradictory logic between the two clauses, in both Chinese and English, together with the subtle shift in tense, produces an almost self-cancelling effect—both a compromise with reality and a subtle resistance to loss of control itself. The sentence condenses Liu Ren and Zhang Ruyi’s acute sensitivity to the anxiety, fragility, and contradictions of contemporary life. Through art, they articulate the individual’s powerlessness and self-irony in the face of the system, yet also an enduring resilience.
Through this exhibition, Yuz Museum seeks to maintain its focus on the microscopic practices of artists living in Shanghai, a city defined by rapid metabolism, within the intertwined contexts of globalization and locality. The works of Liu Ren and Zhang Ruyi not only respond to the order and disjunctions produced by modernity, but also reveal the subtle emotional structures and material flows in urban life. The exhibition explores how, within shared spatial and temporal dimensions, individual artists maintain independence while engaging in close dialogue; and how, beneath the seemingly orderly grid of the city, those minute, fragile, and temporary presences form the true coordinates for navigating contemporary life. Ultimately, the exhibition title points to a paradox of modernity: in the rhythm of the contemporary city, individuals strive to remain perfectly aligned with time, yet constantly experience a distance from it and their own “absence.” Time has never belonged to anyone; perhaps every moment of “punctuality” or “deviation” is an opportunity to recognize the fractures and turning points in our lives.
Yuz Museum
Yuz Museum, officially opened in May 2014 in Shanghai, is a contemporary art museum founded by Mr. Budi Tek, a Chinese-Indonesian entrepreneur, philanthropist, and collector. As one of the first non-profit institutions along the West Bund Culture Corridor, the museum has been following its founder, Budi Tek's philosophy of "collecting to share", with the mission of "drawing the world’s attention to Shanghai" and "bringing art into people's daily lives". Committed to advancing the development of contemporary Chinese art, actively engaging in the field of art education, and promoting cultural dialogues between East and West as its own responsibility, and exploring to answer the question "It takes ten years to grow trees, a hundred years to grow people, then how many years to grow a life of art?" By doing so, it has successfully established a bi-directional parallel between "history" and "future" throughout all its exhibitions and developed a variety of public outreach programs. It introduces the Chinese public to contemporary art and the world to Shanghai and China through its exhibitions that span across China and the West.
Since its opening, Yuz Museum has been the home of many internationally acclaimed exhibitions such as the world's largest "Giacometti Retrospective," the "Rain Room," the Asia premieres of Andy Warhol's “Shadows,” KAWS's "Where the End Starts," "Charlie Chaplin: A Vision," "Yoshitomo Nara," "Watering the Desert: Contemporary Art from Qatar," and etc., which have had a great impact on domestic and international culture, art, education, and other fields.
Yuz Museum has been active in the world of art and has launched in-depth collaborations with many internationally renowned art museums. On October 31, 2019, Yuz Museum Shanghai entered into a landmark collaboration with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and Qatar Museums to jointly develop and share exhibitions and programs across their institutions.
With its continual development, the museum has been looking into possibilities of further expansion and made its home in the core area of Shanghai Greater Hongqiao International Business District. On May 17, 2023, as the new venue of Yuz Museum at Panlong Xintiandi was completed and opened to the public, the museum launched the 2nd phase of its strategic plan: YUZ FLOW. In the coming ten years, the museum will carry on with Mr. Budi Tek's philosophy, further explore how to use "art to grow generations to come", take “flow with Yuz, breathe with art" as its vision for the 2nd stage, and make a gradual layout shift from a "white box" to a "satellite network", marking the start of the museum's 2nd chapter with a brand-new model: "one main space + various encounters".
In 2024, the Yuz Museum launched a children's art education project - YUZ DOLAN, which has been planned and developed by our expert and innovation team for many years. "DOLAN" is derived from the Indonesian Javanese language, meaning "play", and its opening will reshape the museum space into an "art playground" for the participants. Specifically tailored for children, this project is launching diverse content ecosystems including creative art courses, art museum education charity events, and artist's workshops, which are deeply rooted within the Yuz Museum's professional experience in art exhibitions, research collections, and public education. We are committed to creating an artistic paradise for children to grow happily, express themselves, and unleash their creativity.
LACMA
Located on the Pacific Rim, LACMA is the largest art museum in the western United States, with a collection of more than 150,000 objects that illuminate 6,000 years of artistic expression across the globe. Committed to showcasing a multitude of art histories, LACMA exhibits and interprets works of art from new and unexpected points of view that are informed by the region’s rich cultural heritage and diverse population. LACMA's spirit of experimentation is reflected in its work with artists, technologists, and thought leaders as well as in its regional, national, and global partnerships to share collections and programs, create pioneering initiatives, and engage new audiences.
Qatar Museums
Qatar Museums (QM), the nation's preeminent institution for art and culture, provides authentic and inspiring cultural experiences through a growing network of museums, heritage sites, festivals, public art installations, and programmes. QM preserves and expands the nation's cultural offerings, sharing art and culture from Qatar, the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia (MENASA) region with the world and enriching the lives of citizens, residents, and visitors.
Under the patronage of His Highness the Amir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and led by its Chairperson, Her Excellency Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, QM has made Qatar a vibrant centre for the arts, culture, and education in the Middle East and beyond. QM is integral to the goal of developing an innovative, diverse, and progressive nation, bringing people together to ignite new thinking, spark critical cultural conversations, and amplify the voices of Qatar’s people. Since its founding in 2005, QM has overseen the development of museums and festivals including the Museum of Islamic Art (MIA) and MIA Park, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, the National Museum of Qatar (NMOQ), 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, QM Gallery Al Riwaq, QM Gallery Katara, the Tasweer Qatar Photo Festival, and Design Doha. Future projects include Dadu: Children’s Museum of Qatar, Art Mill Museum, Qatar Auto Museum and the Lusail Museum.
Through its newly created Creative Hub, QM also initiates and supports projects – such as the Fire Station Artist in Residence, the Tasweer Qatar Photo Festival, M7, the creative hub for innovation, fashion and design, and Liwan Design Studios and Labs – that nurture artistic talent and create opportunities to build a strong and sustainable cultural infrastructure.
Animating everything that Qatar Museums does is an authentic connection to Qatar and its heritage, a steadfast commitment to inclusivity and accessibility, and a belief in creating value through invention.