# Event Details - **Event Name**: Icons of silence - **Event Start and End Date**: Wed, 26 Aug, 2026 at 10:30 am – Wed, 26 Aug, 2026 at 06:30 pm - **Event Description**: ICONS OF SILENCEA solo exhibition by Woody Xun 3 – 11 September 2026 Private view: Thursday 3 September, from 6.30pm Vanities Gallery, ParisVanities Gallery is pleased to present Icons of Silence, the first Paris exhibition of Woody Xun (荀武), the Chinese artist, painter and theorist of the image. Running from 3 to 11 September 2026, the exhibition brings together a selection of paintings made at the meeting point of two great visual traditions: the sacred art of the West, and the Italian Renaissance in particular, and the iconography of Buddhism.Holding a doctorate in aesthetics from Renmin University of China, and trained at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan and the Accademia di Belle Arti di Napoli, Woody Xun has for some fifteen years pursued a body of work devoted to the representation of the body and to the memory of images. A professor and doctoral supervisor in the arts, he has exhibited in China, Italy, Singapore and Taiwan. His work has been recognised with the Kan Tai-keung Future Masters Award, Hong Kong, and the Zijin Award, and has entered the collection of the National Art Museum of China.A Memory of ImagesIn the works presented here, Pietàs, meditative bodies, frontal faces, hands and fragmented figures set two inheritances in conversation — inheritances the artist seeks neither to oppose nor to reconcile. Christian painting of the Renaissance meets themes drawn from Buddhist thought: Ignorance, Desire, Cessation, Karmic Obstruction, Rebirth.Woody Xun likewise takes up the techniques and forms of early painting, among them egg tempera, oil tempera and painting on wooden panel. The monumentality of the figures and the handling of chiaroscuro recall the great Italian masters, while certain compositions introduce elements that are unmistakably of our own moment.In the Portrait of Silence series, the faces appear at times bound in bandages, in cord, in cellophane. Lit with a dramatic light, these figures seem at once present and prevented from speaking. The body becomes, in this way, the true subject of the work: a body divested, so far as it can be, of the religious, moral, cultural and social narratives that have historically defined it."I do not paint for a belief; I paint with the memory of beliefs. The Pietà and Buddhist emptiness serve me the same question: what remains of the body once the story we tell about it is taken away?" — Woody XunSilence as a Space of FreedomIn Woody Xun's hands, the reference to early art is never nostalgic. The images of the past become open forms, detached from their original function, through which we may examine our contemporary regard for the body, for desire, for vulnerability and for identity.The silence of the exhibition's title is therefore not an absence. It names the moment at which the image ceases to explain and gives way to looking. Between the presence of the body and the effacement of its narrative, the works of Woody Xun offer an experience that is deliberately enigmatic, in which no single reading is ever finally imposed.Icons of Silence thus invites us to look afresh at images we believe we know, and to ask what remains once the stories that accompanied them fall silent.Vanities Gallery — Paris Exhibition: 3 – 11 September 2026 Private view: Thursday 3 September, from 6.30pm - **Event URL**: https://allevents.in/paris/icons-of-silence/80009304105693 - **Event Categories**: art, exhibitions, fine-arts, meetups, drawing-painting - **Interested Audience**: - total_interested_count: 0 ## Ticket Details ## Event venue details - **city**: Paris - **state**: IDF - **country**: France - **location**: vanities gallery - **lat**: 48.8509434 - **long**: 2.3695955 - **full address**: vanities gallery, 17 Rue Biscornet, 75012 Paris, France, Paris ## Event gallery - **Alt text**: Event Photo 1 - **Image URL**: https://cdn2.allevents.in/thumbs/live6a8da5fe5bb31.jpg - **Alt text**: Event Photo 2 - **Image URL**: https://cdn2.allevents.in/thumbs/live6a8da5f8a0b73.jpg - **Alt text**: Event Photo 3 - **Image URL**: https://cdn2.allevents.in/thumbs/live6a8da5eb20552.jpg ## FAQs - **Q**: When and where is Icons of silence being held? - **A:** Icons of silence takes place on Wed, 26 Aug, 2026 at 10:30 am to Wed, 26 Aug, 2026 at 06:30 pm at vanities gallery, 17 Rue Biscornet, 75012 Paris, France, Paris. - **Q**: Who is organizing Icons of silence? - **A:** Icons of silence is organized by Vanities Gallery. ## Structured Data (JSON-LD) ```json [ { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Event", "name": "Icons of silence", "image": "https://cdn2.allevents.in/thumbs/thumb6a8da51fab9ea.jpg", "startDate": "2026-08-26", "endDate": "2026-08-26", "url": "https://allevents.in/paris/icons-of-silence/80009304105693", "location": { "@type": "Place", "name": "vanities gallery", "address": { "@type": "PostalAddress", "streetAddress": "17 Rue Biscornet, 75012 Paris, France", "postalCode": "75012", "addressLocality": "Paris", "addressRegion": "IDF", "addressCountry": "FR" }, "geo": { "@type": "GeoCoordinates", "latitude": "48.8509434", "longitude": "2.3695955" } }, "eventAttendanceMode": "https://schema.org/OfflineEventAttendanceMode", "description": "ICONS OF SILENCEA solo exhibition by Woody Xun 3 – 11 September 2026 Private view: Thursday 3 September, from 6.30pm Vanities Gallery, ParisVanities Gallery is pleased to present Icons of Silence, the first Paris exhibition of Woody Xun (荀武), the Chinese artist, painter and theorist of the image. 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