Nesie Junyi Wang

My practice bridges art and research to explore the intricate relationships between humans and the environments they inhabit. Drawing on field studies and material investigations, I work across mediums such as photography, printmaking, and film to examine narratives that emerge from spaces in transformation. These stories reveal how beings adapt to and interact with shifting landscapes, navigating the tension between order and uncertainty. Collaboration, locality, and materiality lie at the core of my practice. Grounded in fieldwork that prioritizes lived experiences, I trace the subtle, evolving dynamics of shared spaces, creating work that uncovers situated stories and reflects on the fluid boundaries between ecological systems and cultural narratives. Through this process, I explore how these layers intertwine, reshaping our understanding of human-nonhuman entanglements and challenging the constructs that separate us from the environments we inhabit. For example, my recent work (Rocks, roots, unearth) at a copper mine in China highlights the uncertainty and adaptability of miners in relation to the land they work on. Through fieldwork, I focused on a group of miners and their part-time gardening practices—an act of reclaiming agency and forging connections with a landscape undergoing industrial transformation. Conversations with the miners revealed a deeply layered, lived experience of their daily negotiations, living in the shadows of industrialization. This project also incorporated printmaking experiments using copper tailings sand as a material, creating tactile works that reflect the entangled relationships between industry, ecology, and labor.