Synthesizing evolutionary biology and eroticism, Echo Yan's work portrays transgressive forces that induce physical metamorphosis, and alter our understanding of the body and cognition. Her art presents dominance and submission as one entity.
Her recent works explore the anthropological hypothesis of humanity’s self-domestication. The notion that human culture produces a context for the selective breeding of behavioral traits like cooperation and tolerance leads to a self-induced process of domestication. The artist uses this theory that disrupts traditional social-construction power dynamics into creature-like sculptures.
She creates the tensions that arise when seemingly opposing attributes are brought together. These tensions are materialized into pulling of the bilical cord, violent penetrations, long-dwelling infestations, and suggestive strokes of the tail. Her sculptures are a marriage of contrasting materials and textures. The gentle suppleness of fur and silicone grapples with the unyielding fortitude of metal and wood, coalescing into a duality of clashing forces. Intricately carved wood pieces take on biomorphic shapes, coated in a bubble-filled membrane resembling bodilyfluids made of resin, produced from artist's recipe. The resin is reminiscent of the very essence of life. Vein-like wood grain patterns emerge under the translucent resin, and seem to be constantly contracting and expanding. These sculptures provoke the home-bred humans to reflect on their primal lust, corporal fragility and the paradoxical nature of the forces residing within them. Her recent exhibitions include: Open Kitchen - Assembly, curated by Phil Cai, New York, 2024. What if We Lose the Ground, at Accent Sisters, Jersey City, 2024. 9, at theBLANC Art Space, New York, 2023, Interwoven Souls: United in Loneliness, at Sotheby’s Institute of Art, New York 2023. A Happy Beginning, at LATITUDE Gallery, New York, 2023. Genesis: A New Generation of Chinese Artists, at Chambers Fine Art, 2023, MOLD-ING, with Stilllife, at 216 Lafayette St, New York, 2023. Mycelia, at Commons Gallery, 34 Stuyvesant St, New York, 2023. Nature v.s. Nurture, at 80WSE Gallery, 80 Washington Square E, New York, NY 10003, 2023. Werewolf/Ferryman (Relic), at Commons Gallery in New York University, 34 Stuyvesant St, New York, 2022. Island of Light, at 559 W 23rd Street, New York, 2022.
Echo now lives and works in New York, NY.