The Plan of Going Home Exhibition Information | Jelly Troupe--Imaginaries / Daydream of an Island

Exhibition Title：Imaginaries / Daydream of an Island

Location: Atrium,3rd Floor,Student Learning and Activity Center, Wenzhou-Kean University 

Time：

2025.12.8-12.18，

2026.1.5-2026.1.23，

2026.2.26-2.28

In early 2026, the Hong Museum will organize and plan a group exhibition related to Wenzhou/food, named The Plan of Going Home. The artistic residency project in the early stage of the exhibition is supported by academic support from te editions and co-initiated with Wenzhou-Kean University Library and the Nastore. The exhibition will focus on local food culture as the creative object, sorting out the ecological limitations and immigration changes under Wenzhou cuisine, or using a certain food/ingredient from Wenzhou as a starting point to touch on a larger cultural context, and translating it through contemporary art methods. The exhibition will be mainly held at the Hong Museum, with Dishbooks and Wenzhou-Kean University Library as sub venues.

As the satellite venue of the 2026 exhibition, the Library of Wenzhou-Kean University and the Hong Art Museum present an exhibition titled Imaginaries / Daydream of an Island to everyone in advance. This exhibition is curated by members of the Jelly Troupe, the artist-in-residence of The Plan of Going Home. The exhibition takes Rockcoat Jelly from Beice Island in Wenzhou as the research subject, and is a ritualized memorial installation generated through a series of workshops. It is dedicated to Rockcoat Jelly and to the fishing community of Shuitan Village, whose labor once sustained this craft and whose presence has now largely faded. 

In the exhibition, the colorful fence material we see is made of plastic film with a jelly-like texture. The objects displayed in the exhibition were brought by participants in the previous workshop. The artist attempts to use these fences and the collective creations of the participants to simulate the living conditions of Beice Island, generating new public spaces from individual pasts. The work honors the tenacity, lively, and vitality of Shuitan’s older generation. It also honors the ways people rely on one another and face reality together. By entrusting our personal past to a shared imagination of space, we aim to inspire the imagination of narrative rights concerning our own forms and colors.

Rockweed Jelly, a Wenzhou specialty snack with a long history, has been passed down from the Ming Dynasty and has been around for over 600 years. In Shuitan Village, Yongxing Street, Longwan District, fishermen collect precious rockweed from Beice Island and carefully prepare it into the raw material for this delicious dish. The combination of nutrient-rich rockweed and unique preparation techniques creates this unique Wenzhou specialty snack. In 2013, the rockweed preparation skills of Shuitan Village were officially listed in the seventh batch of Wenzhou Intangible Cultural Heritage List.

This project was collaboratively created by the Jelly Troupe together with Maggie, Zhu Yan, Yang Chang, Liu Kailu, Xing Ye, Li Tongtong, Ke Qiongmiu, He Anruo, Zhang Qi, Zhao Yinuo, He Oumiao, Ding Jiahui, Zhu Ziran, Zhang Richen，and Zhang Jiarui, Zhang Yifeng, Wang Yitong, Zhou Jingqiao, Bao Feihai, Zheng Congyue, Xie Yi，Tang Lianyi who participated in the Wenzhou-Kean University workshop and realized with the support of Hong Museum and WKU Library.

This exhibition is also open to the public.