Chang Niu

Behind The Curtain explores how individuals are shaped within educational and social systems, while still enacting subtle forms of resistance. Drawing from the artist’s personal experience in the Chinese public school system, the project combines photography and video to reconstruct personal memories, including illusions of a blue curtain, standardized testing, and repetitive gestures like pen twirling. Materials such as glass, shadow, and collage are similarly employed to visualize boundaries, layering, and a sense of constant transformation. Rather than critiquing the system directly, the work evokes a “grey zone” where control and freedom can coexist, revealing how identity is continuously reshaped within rigid structures.

Chang (Cici) Niu is an artist based in New York, working with photography and video.