ONE WORK | Wei Zhang, 'The Silver Tide' (2025)

In May we will premiere Wei Zhang’s new work The Silver Tide (2025) as part of our ONE WORK series. This online screening will be accompanied by a recorded discussion between Wei Zhang and David Upton, Public Programme Manager at LUX Scotland, and a newly commissioned text responding to the work by film writer and curator, Cici Peng.

Set against Glasgow’s industrial backdrop, The Silver Tide explores the struggle of finding a voice within Chinese queer diaspora. When the constraints of a foreign language fail to capture the complexity of lived experience, a profound physical transmogrification begins.

The work weaves together the raw, nostalgic grain of Super 8 film with the fluid precision of 3D animation. Drawing on the mythology of Chiyou (蚩尤) and the intricate traditions of Miao (苗族) silverwork, the film fuses the migrant body with the heritage of Scottish craft.

By moving beyond the verbal, The Silver Tide constructs a tactile, sensory experience. It reframes the ​‘monstrous’ body not as a deviation, but as a generative site of dignity, power, and constant rebirth.

Wei Zhang (b. 1991, China) is a filmmaker and visual artist based in Glasgow, Scotland. Currently a PhD candidate at Kingston School of Art, Zhang engages in practice-based research exploring the intersections of the Chinese queer diaspora, bodily transmogrification, and the ​“crisis of articulation” within artists’ moving image.

Driven by the limitations of spoken language, Zhang’s work challenges logocentric structures to investigate how migrant and queer bodies interact with their sociopolitical environments. Drawing upon Oriental monster culture, queer theory, and posthumanism, their practice reframes non-normative gendered experiences. Rather than viewing these bodily transformations as deviations, Zhang approaches transmogrification as a powerful site of agency and resilience.

Utilising collage techniques, hybrid media, and experimental soundscapes, Zhang creates multi-layered narratives that bridge personal memory and collective histories. Their work has been showcased internationally at exhibitions and festivals including Glasgow International 2024, Adelaide Fringe 2025, and Bangkok Biennial 2020.