“It’s about how to speak the unspeakable”: artist Lotus Kang's new work explores absence as an opportunity

Artist Lotus L Kang has created a new installation titled 'The Face of Desire is Loss' for the inaugural Bulgari Pavilion at the 61st Venice Biennale. The pavilion, located at the Giardini entrance, features Kang's signature use of light-sensitive photographic film that reacts to the environment, suspended from steel joists with large holes inspired by the lotus root motif. The work draws on a line by poet Lara Mimosa Montes and explores themes of absence, loss, and the void, with the film changing color over time from deep purple to hues resembling bruise, blood, and bile.