MELBOURNE.- Monash University Museum of Art | MUMA is presenting the inaugural Australian solo exhibition by acclaimed Chinese-American artist Candice Lin. Renowned for her innovative use of natural materials and her playful exploration of marginalised and silenced histories, MUMA’s exhibition The Sex Life of Stone is on view free to the public until 7 September 2024, promises an immersive journey into the intersections of art, history, queer theory and ecology including the intriguing sexual properties of sea slugs.

"MUMA is delighted to be presenting this timely exhibition by leading contemporary artist Candice Lin. MUMA’s exhibitions are rigorously research-led and engaged with presenting new and innovative ideas within a global contemporary context.

Lin offers us a new language to think about our role in the contemporary moment. The exhibition showcases a new major co-commission developed in partnership with the Sydney Biennale contextualised by other recent new works by the artist. This is the first time that the breadth of Lin’s practice and ideas have been presented to Australian audiences. Within a university context, the show reveals her often humorous, sometimes trippy, immersive research-based, material-focussed processes, inviting us to consider received histories, the agency of animals, and our relationships to near neighbours" comments Dr. Rebecca Coates, Director of MUMA.

MUMA's exhibition features a new installation Untitled 2024, co-commissioned by MUMA with the 24th Biennale of Sydney, that delves into the speculative and historical entanglements surrounding manganese pigment, industrial mining, ancient trade routes linking Asia and Australia, and the intriguing sexual properties of sea slugs. Lin's ambitious work extends her long-time use of ceramics in the creation of a large-scale sculptural pool, employing techniques inspired by Chinese irrigation and water wheels, and adorned with black manganese pigment and gold manganese glaze to evoke holographic reflections.

Continuing Lin’s exploration of the life of animals and their relationship to the human world, an audio component will feature an anthropomorphised sea slug in Lin’s voice reflecting on the effect of manganese pollution on the marine ecosystem, leading to a transformation of its sexuality.

Alongside this immersive centrepiece, the exhibition showcases Lin’s recent installation including Lithium Sex Demons in the Factory and her animated films The Blueness and The Animal Husband, offering Australian audiences a comprehensive view of Lin's diverse artistic practice.

“Through her fascination for materials Candice brings historical excavations and speculative musings together in fecund environments. We are invited to share her curiosity and reflect on the long threads of the past that stretch into our collective futures," comments Pip Wallis, Senior Curator, MUMA.

Curated by Pip Wallis, Senior Curator at MUMA, the exhibition is accompanied by a commissioned science-fiction story by Canadian novelist and critic Larissa Lai published on an artist poster designed by Ziga Testen and Stuart Geddes. Additionally, MUMA will host a series of public programs to engage audiences with Lin's work, including cat-led art tours and the launch of a limited edition ‘The Sex Life of Stone Aphrodisiac Tea’ developed by the artist in partnership with Melbourne beverage retailer Assembly.

Candice Lin, currently serving as Assistant Professor of Art at the University of California, Los Angeles, has exhibited extensively worldwide, with recent solo exhibitions at prestigious venues such as the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the Kunsthalle Osnabrück, and the Institute of Contemporary Arts in New York University, Shanghai.

Noteworthy group exhibitions include appearances at the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, the 13th Gwangju Biennale, the MOMENTA Biennale de l'image in Montreal, and the Prospect.5 New Orleans Triennial and the 24th Biennale of Sydney.

Candice Lin (b. 1979, Concord, US) is a Chinese-American artist based in Los Angeles. Lin currently holds the position of Assistant Professor of Art at the University of California, Los Angeles. She has exhibited widely including recent solo exhibitions Seeping, Rotting, Resting, Weeping, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2021); The Glittering Cloud, Kunsthalle Osnabrück (2021); and Stressed Herms, Sweat, & Period Gas, Institute of Contemporary Arts, New York University, Shanghai (2020). Selected group exhibitions include the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia (2022); 13th Gwangju Biennale (2021); MOMENTA Biennale de l’image, Montreal (2021); and Prospect.5 New Orleans Triennial (2021).

Lin has received several grants and fellowships including the Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Grant (2019); Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Grant (2017); and the California Community Foundation Emerging Artist Fellowship (2014). She has held residencies at the Fine Arts Work Center, Provincetown (2012) and Deutsche Börse, Frankfurter Kunstverein (2010). Three monographs are dedicated to Lin: Pigs and Poison, Mousse Publishing, Milan (2023); Book of Secrets, Occidental College, Los Angeles (2019); and A Hard White Body, University of Chicago Press (2019).