Hua Xi Zi works and thinks about light and the experience of seeing – in exploring the flowing life and one’s relation with outside systems. From celluloid film, analogue video signal to digital video processing, screen-based and optical projections, installed and performed, Xi Zi questions the existing methods of shadow-image production by experimenting with alternative ways to “un-expose.” It is the refusal to use representational images to explicitly represent one topic, community, or ideology. Her practice and research turned into materiality while asking questions about spectatorship and participation – seeking for the tenderness that withholds freedom and forgiveness. Hua Xi Zi received her MFA in Film, Video, New Media and Animation at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and BA in Cinema and Media Studies at University of Southern California.