Chinese-born, Paris-based painter Xie Lei has spent nearly two decades perfecting what he calls a 'poetics of the strange' in his canvases, which feature ghostly, gender-ambiguous figures in ambiguous situations—such as a kiss that could also be an act of suffocation. His works, which draw on memory rather than live models, will be exhibited at the Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris in September 2025. Xie cites influences ranging from classical Western painters like Delacroix and Goya to French authors Albert Camus and Jean Genet, as well as psychoanalyst Julia Kristeva and Chinese writers Zhuang Zhou and Pu Songling.
This article matters because it offers an in-depth look at a contemporary painter whose work bridges Eastern and Western artistic traditions while exploring universal themes of ambiguity and the uncanny. Xie's upcoming museum show at a major Paris institution signals growing institutional recognition for his distinctive, psychologically charged figurative painting, which challenges conventional narrative interpretation and expands the possibilities of contemporary portraiture.