Silent Horizons
Kai Liu
Simone Guo
April 9 to 25, 2026
Noon to 5 pm.
Tuesday to Saturday
Opening Reception: Saturday, April 11th
2 to 4 pm.
Silent Horizons invites viewers to enter a quiet and contemplative space, where the artworks explore the serenity and vitality of nature. The two artists focus on the liminal zone where land meets sky, seeking to capture moments of stillness that speak louder than words.
Simone Guo
Artist Statement
Through my Chinese lens, I respond to the lush landscapes of the Northwest Coast with deep sensitivity, explore painting’s capacity in materializing emotion and temperament, and further transforming a familiar terrain into a mysterious, dreamlike realm.
My imagery does not represent specific scenes; it depicts the emotionally charged landscape of an inner world. Within these imagined places, I highlight the essential forms while embracing the complexity of nature, at once vulnerable and tender. My practice is also informed by the aesthetic and philosophical traditions of Chinese literati landscape painting, which is expressive yet meditative, sublime yet serene. These influences are reflected in a floating perspective, a fluid sense of space and time, the gestures and atmosphere.
As a cosmic process, in nature everything returns to its source, same with art. In search of my artistic roots I aim to understand myself. In the cyclical world of both nature and art making, I keep wandering and wondering, finding beauty amid chaos, and looking for signs of clarity within a cross-cultural context.
Bio
Simone Guo is a Chinese-Canadian artist based in Metro Vancouver BC, known for her distinct yet poetic landscape style. Born into an artistic family in China, Guo grew up learning Chinese brush painting and calligraphy. She then studied visual arts and art history at Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, China. In 2001 she moved to Canada and earned the Master of Art History degree from the University of Victoria. Guo shows her work in public and private galleries throughout B.C., and her works are currently represented by Art Rental & Sales at Vancouver Art Gallery.
藝術家郭西萌(Simone Guo)生於藝術家庭，自幼隨父親學習大寫意花鳥畫和書法，現生 活和創作與溫哥華。她畢業於中央美術學院，擁有藝術史碩士學位，又於2004年獲得加拿 大維多利亞大學藝術史碩士學位。 她出版有「伊斯蘭藝術」、「美國藝術」、「星月之 輝—古代兩河文明」(合著)等中文書籍;她的繪畫作品在卑詩省公立美術館廣泛展出， 長期與精藝軒(Art Beatus Gallery)、視覺空間(Visual Space Gallery) 等商業空間合作，同 時是溫哥華美術館租售部(VAG Art Rental & Sales)的簽約藝術家。她也積極參與本地公 共藝術創作，曾擔任列治文市和西溫哥華市多項公共藝術項目和展覽的評審委員。
Kai Liu
Artist Statement
Revisiting the Representational
After a year devoted to abstraction, a quiet dissatisfaction drew me back toward the figurative — a renewed attentiveness to form, place, and the visible world. Through a series of small studies, I began negotiating the boundary between sensation and representation, ultimately arriving at a new body of semi-abstract work. These pieces are grounded in West Coast landscapes: coastal wind, afternoon light dissolving over water, horizons softened by haze. I am drawn to the way nature composes and flattens itself across distance — shifting patterns of light and atmosphere that migrate across terrain, transforming familiar forms into something at once legible and strange. The works seek not to document these conditions, but to distill them.
Bio
Kai Liu is a Chinese-Canadian artist whose practice is rooted in painting and extends into printmaking and mixed media. Through a semi-abstract approach grounded in observation, his work explores the relationships between landscape, nature, and the conditions of transition. Guided by an interest in how perception, place, and belonging shape visual language, Liu draws from Eastern aesthetics to create works that reveal a balance between stillness and movement, structure and openness, clarity and ambiguity.
Liu was born and raised in China, where he studied drawing and painting before moving into animation. Relocating to Canada, he worked as a graphic designer in Ontario before settling in British Columbia to pursue the visual arts. He studied printmaking at Langara College and holds a BFA and MFA from Emily Carr University of Art + Design. His work has been exhibited across Canada and featured in various publications. In addition to his studio practice, Liu teaches visual arts in both academic and community settings.
藝術家簡介
劉凱是一位華裔加拿大藝術家，專注於繪畫、版畫及混合媒材的創作。他的作品源於觀察，採用半抽象手法，通過風景探討自然與變化，表達地域感與歸屬感，融合中西方美學的視覺語言，追求靜與動、結構與開放、清晰與模糊之間的和諧平衡。劉凱出生並成長於中國，系統學習繪畫，後轉入動畫領域。移居加拿大後，曾在安大略省從事平面設計，隨後定居於不列顛哥倫比亞省，專注於視覺藝術的學習與創作。他曾就讀於蘭加拉學院修習版畫，並獲得艾米莉卡爾藝術與設計大學的美術學士與碩士學位，作品曾在加拿大多個地區展出。目前，劉凱在其個人工作室專注於創作，亦在藝術院校與社區機構教授視覺藝術。