Sun Xun (born 1980, Fuxin, China) is one of China’s most exciting young artists, best known for his animations made up of thousands of ink paintings, charcoal drawings and woodcuts. Containing very little dialogue, these hand-made films use combinations of image, sound and text to raise questions about what we perceive as truth and explore the slippery dynamics of memory, history, culture and politics.

Sun Xun’s works often highlight the absurd incongruities between authorised histories and personal recollections, and are particularly concerned with how history can be manipulated, interrogating the differences between official narratives presented by public agencies, politicians and the media — and more marginalised accounts that stem from ordinary people’s experiences.

This is Sun Xun’s first solo exhibition in Australia. The exhibition includes a number of Sun Xun’s most important animated works and encompasses both the MCA’s Level 1 North and South Galleries. The artist has created a major new work especially for the MCA exhibition, a 40-metre-long painting on bark paper and series of woodcuts, on display in the Level 1 North Gallery. The MCA also invited Sun Xun to do a residency project over one week at the start of the exhibition, where he created a 10-metre-long painting in view of the public in the Level 1 South Gallery.