In
the depths of the sea, during the mating of anglerfish, the male– mere
centimeters in size– seeks out his significantly larger female counterpart. He
bites onto her belly, and eventually their tissues fuse; the male assimilates
into the female’s bloodstream as they become permanently united in the vast
ocean depths. Marine biologists believe this extraordinary symbiosis is driven
by the challenge of encountering one’s own kind in the remote oceanic expanses.

Xinan
Ran’s second exhibition at Essex Flowers Gallery, titled “Crumbs and
Lather,” draws inspiration from this moment of deep-sea bonding and uses
it as a quaint metaphor to mirror the frugal practice of joining a nearly
finished sliver of soap with a new bar– a common household act that conserves the
smaller piece and prolongs the utility of the soap. This act of merging,
familiar to many, harks back to a more challenging era when thriftiness was a
daily necessity.

“Crumbs
and Lather” delves into these acts of “cleansing”, bringing to light the often
overlooked “crumbs” of daily routine– the laundering of stains, the wiping away
of handprints, and the collection, melting, and display of used soap pieces by
various individuals. The exhibition aims to illuminate the collective imprints
we leave on unseen layers of our urban interactions, emphasizing this shared
act of mark-making in our collective presence.

Participating
soap contributors: Tsubasa Berg, Noémie Jennifer Bonnet, Miguel Alejandro
Castillo, Jamie Chan, Cynthia Chen, Patrick Costello, Maria Jose García
Estevez, Kate Fry, Kathleen Granados, Kristen Heritage, Patrick Mohundro,
Camilla Padgitt-Coles, Fangyu Liu, Xiran Luo, Tyrel Stokes, Micaela Varela,
Jerome Wang, Martha Wilson, Queenie Wong, Marissa Wu, Amos Yeung, Aman Zaeghum
and April Zhu.

Xinan
Ran received her MFA from Hunter College
(2022), and BFA from Pratt Institute (2017). Ranked “Highbrow and Brilliant” by
the New York Magazine Matrix, Xinan is a 2024 More Art Commission Artist, a
2024 New York State Council on the Arts grant recipient, was a mentee in New
York Foundation for the Arts’s Immigrant Artist Mentoring Program (2023), a
Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Arts Center resident (2022), and an Ox-Bow
Summer Fellow (2016). Apart from her studio practice, Xinan is an art educator,
an art administrator and an aspirational set designer for new theaters. www.xinanran.work