And while Xu’s historical references include Caravaggio, Rembrandt and Velázquez, she also draws upon their less-celebrated female counterparts, from Italian baroque painter Artemisia Gentileschi to Swiss neoclassical painter Angelica Kauffman. The latter’s Portrait of a Lady was the inspiration for Xu’s Tate Collective commission: Perhaps We are All Fictions in the Eye of the Beholder, a painting in which Xu is shown as both model and artist in lashings of pink tulle and dramatic make-up.
“I became completely obsessed with historical portraits,” says 27-year-old Xu, who grew up in rural north-east China and was classically trained in painting before moving to London, where she is now represented by Berntson Bhattacharjee gallery. “But here I discovered my own sexuality: being queer, being pansexual. Drag is a way for me to express my own identity; it’s liberating. This is a Generation Z queer Asian woman confronting the viewer. It subverts the male gaze as well as gender stereotypes and the social norm.”
