Chi-Wen gallery is pleased to present “Notes on Psychedelics II: Inside a Memorable Fancy”, an exhibition comprised of two separate projects by Yin-Ju Chen. The first, with the same title as the exhibition, consists of five charcoal drawings and three videos, through which the artist shares her personal experiences after drinking an herbal soup during a shamanic ritual. The second, “Sonic Driving”, is made up of watercolour drawings, video and document. This project illustrates the visual apperceptions (or perceptible brainwave transitions) that were triggered by relentless, ritualistic shamanic drumming. Through drawings and paintings, Yin-Ju depicts her own involvement between and within the mind, body, and spirit worlds.

Yin-Ju Chen is skilled at using occultism and pseudo-science as narratives to explain the individual psyche vis-à-vis the universe as a whole. In recent years, Yin-Ju Chen has drawn much attention at home and abroad from fine-art museums and institutions to her video installations and drawings. Her latest projects engage in the relations between cosmos and human behaviour. “Notes on Psychedelics” (2015) was a survey of drugs, consciousness, and the soul. It investigated the motivations behind the consumption of psychedelic drugs and focused on a substance called “DMT” (N,N-Dimethyltryptamine). Continuing from this, but in contrast to her previous artistic approach, “Notes on Psychedelics II: Inside a Memorable Fancy” (2018) focuses instead on the artist’s personal experiences.