A boxed set of 4 fine bone china sinner plates by Firenze Lai (edition of 30)
Firenze Lai says that she knows her studio of a few hundred square feet intimately; from the textures of its surfaces to the way the breeze blows into the room. The spaces depicted in her paintings are equally intimate. When curators seem to be at a loss for words to discuss troubled times, fear of containment, and the feeling of being completely enmeshed in a space, they turn to Lai's paintings, which have been shown as part of Para Site's A Journal of the Plague Year. Fear, ghosts, rebels. SARS, Leslie and the Hong Kong story (17 May–20 July 2013), and A Hundred Years of Shame—Songs of Resistance and Scenarios for Chinese Nations (6 March–17 May 2015). Further, Lai has shown work in international solo and group presentations, including Turbulence at Mirrored Gardens in Guangzhou (29 October–28 November 2015), the 10th Shanghai Biennale, Social Factory (23 November 2014–31 March 2015), the 2015 New Museum Triennial, Surround Audience (25 February–24 May 2015), and in Venice for the 57th Venice Biennale (13 May–26 November 2017). More recently, a selection of nine of Lai's paintings appear in Tai Kwun Contemporary's Contagious Cities: Far Away, Too Close (26 January–21 April 2019).