Recently, Chinese contemporary artist Cai Wanlin received an invitation from the Lombardy region of Italy. His works, the YY series, will be exhibited at the Lombardy Christmas exhibition "Art in the Heart", Italy. This is the first time that a Chinese artist has participated in this annual exhibition. The exhibition will be held at the Isola Set exhibition space of the Lombardy Palace, opening on December 3, 2024 and running until January 6, 2025.

The first Christmas art event in Lombardy, Italy, attracted more than 20,000 visitors. This year, a large exhibition with the theme of "Art in the Heart" was added. The exhibition will bring works including pop art, surrealism and design. The curator calls it a "magical world" constructed by artists, aiming to convey emotions through aesthetics and culture through the linkage of painting, sculpture and fashion. Works by world-renowned artists including Andy Warhol, Giorgio de Chirico, Gaetano Pesce, Flavio Lucchini, Dozio and others will be on display in Lombardy, Italy. Regarding the special invitation of Tsai Wan-lin to the exhibition, the person in charge of the exhibition said, "I am excited, proud and excited to be able to exhibit the works of this outstanding Chinese contemporary artist for the first time, to get closer to the great Eastern culture, and to reach a global cultural consensus and art alliance through contemporary art."

In less than three years, the image of yy created by Tsai Wan-lin has swept across Europe. Since winning the Venice Golden Lion Award in 2022, yy has held solo exhibitions in many museums, including the Mastio della Cittadella Museum in Turin and the Milan Cultural Museum. Due to the favor of contemporary audiences, the exhibitions have been repeatedly postponed. Moreover, Tsai Wan-lin's 2024 Italian solo exhibition "Silent Existence" is hosted by the Alessandria Financial Asset Management Foundation, and this batch of sculptures will be permanently collected by the foundation, which indicates that the image of yy has all the elements from popular culture to asset attributes.

In 2024, Tsai Wan-lin created a series of latest YY works in his Italian studio. We also noticed that the cultural context and the proposition of the times in which these YY are located have changed again. "A Familiar and Strange Place" seems to respond to the issue of cross-cultural identity, which seems to have a deeper meaning at a time when globalization is encountering twists and turns. The original division between hometown and foreign land has gradually moved towards the synthesis of humanism and globalism, but the new cracks caused by the changes in the world pattern have made us suddenly find that those familiar landscapes have become strange and alienated. "If We Are Designed" unfolds imagination in the way of social science fiction. Are "I" and the entire group and society designed or will be designed? Is the designer artificial intelligence, power will or high-dimensional system? This open proposition seems to have a different meaning at the crossroads of technological and institutional development.

The two works "Choice" and "Backward" are about direction. "Backward" is a kind of looking back or retreating. YY's looking back is hard to guess, and the choice at the crossroads, YY's chin in contemplation, is a portrayal of people's fate in an uncertain era. Vincenzo Sanfo, an internationally renowned curator, wrote, "Contemporary art is like a road extending in different directions." In Tsai Wan-lin's new work "Voice of the Heart" in Italy, YY is holding a blue book with "SKY" written on it, which is a beautiful wish to fly freely. This voice of the heart is the expectation that the artist gives to the world and mankind through YY. Sanford said, "Through Tsai Wan-lin, YY has become a character with his own world, outlook on life and independent identity, and he can travel around innocently like Forrest Gump. He is a projection of Tsai Wan-lin himself to a certain extent, and a projection of all of us, our other self. In his loneliness, he reminds us that we are inevitably lonely no matter where we are, even in a bustling crowd. However, YY's loneliness is accompanied by a subtle ability that can resonate with anyone who sees him the moment he sees him."

As a Zen practitioner, Tsai Wan-lin enters the sixth space through daily meditation. This experience beyond the daily life is also shown through YY. "YY's Sixth Space" constructs a quiet blue space, which is the birthplace of YY, a pure world beyond the present, perhaps another planet in space, or a spiritual pure land on the other side. The blue is like the deep ocean, the infinite universe, and the Xumi Mountain and the Three Thousand Worlds. Spacecraft, submarines, pagodas, insects... all of these have become the embodiment of YY, and also show the scalability of YY. This exhibition will also display the extension of the series "From the Sixth Space". With the technical forms and content products such as animation, movies, games, and AR, YY has not only achieved a breakthrough in the concept of contemporary art, but also developed more possibilities in public cultural products.

YY is as free as the soul of an artist, and it shines into the hearts of all beings like a mirror. Therefore, no matter what cultural background the audience is, they will be obsessed with YY. When talking about YY, Fu Jun, director of the Shanghai Oil Painting and Sculpture Institute Art Museum, called it "a messenger of highly connected humanity with a cosmopolitan sentiment", "At a time when different civilizations are paying more and more attention to communication and interconnection, YY, as a refreshing cartoon image created by the Chinese, will increasingly highlight its intermediary significance as a cultural symbol." It cuts into the concept of contemporary art in the form of trendy art, while containing the philosophy of oriental Zen masters and having a global universal context. In the contemporary era when globalization is encountering twists and turns, the super-cultural YY has aroused heated discussions and pursuits in the Western world, which means that this image is becoming a messenger to bridge cultural rifts. He is free from the inheritance of all traditional symbols, can lead the trend, and is heavy and universal enough in spiritual genes. This is exactly in line with the theme of this exhibition, "Art in the Heart". When the heart seeks outside, it will inevitably produce delusion and conflict with the finite. The silent and inaudible YY turns to inner practice, which also becomes an artistic revelation of the door to happiness and wisdom. When each audience gains improvement through YY's observation of the times, perhaps a new power to change the world will be generated.

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