Qiuchen Wu’s Exploration of Ownership at The First Presbyterian Church of Chicago

This summer, the Narthex Gallery, located in the north bell tower of the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago, hosted its inaugural exhibition featuring a series installment of paintings, co-signed by Qiuchen Wu and Wilson Yerxa who is labeled as a one of Wu’s Three American Painters. The exhibition, intriguingly unnamed and without explicit labels on the works, challenges viewers to question: What is this about? And perhaps more critically: Who is the artist?

These questions lie at the heart of the exhibition’s exploration of property, ownership, and identity. Rather than providing straightforward answers, the exhibition invites visitors to engage with the slippery nature of these concepts, using the physical and conceptual spaces within the church to provoke thought. 

Visitors entering the Gothic Revival cathedral, built in 1927, are immediately confronted with a curious juxtaposition: a vintage SONY Trinitron TV playing a scene from the Japanese anime Doraemon, where Nobita builds a miniature city free from adult interference. Across from the TV hangs a painting of three houses, presenting architecture in three distinct forms—the real, the animated, and the painted. Each medium carries its own tone, from the church’s solemnity to the anime’s innocence and the painting’s eerie quality.

This layering of different media and then scales—grand architecture, medium-sized anime, and small painting—immediately raises questions about how we perceive and relate to different forms of reality and representation. The viewer is invited to consider not just the physical differences but also the conceptual implications of these varied presentations.

As visitors ascend to the second floor, the atmosphere shifts dramatically. The warm, inviting space below gives way to a more austere environment, where darkness and light are starkly contrasted. Here, a drawing backlit by white LED lights depicts a scene of impending violence: one figure is about to punch another, but the potential victim seems more focused on the aggressor’s wristwatch than on the imminent attack.

This puzzling detail invites multiple interpretations. Is the person being punched so absorbed in observing the “other”—in this case, the wristwatch—that they neglect their own self-preservation? This scene provokes deeper questions about attention, distraction, and the complexities of interpersonal relationships in moments of conflict.

On the third floor, natural light floods the space through beautiful stained glass windows, creating a stark contrast to the artificial light below. A ladder stands in the middle of the room, leading up to the bell tower, and across from the stained glass is a similarly colorful painting. Upon closer inspection, the painting reveals an ambiguous yet provocative image: an animal watching two people engage in a reproductive act.

This unsettling image reappears in the basement, this time drawn simply and lit only by candlelight in an abandoned bathroom. The rawness of this imagery within the sacred space of a church raises challenging questions about the coexistence of the spiritual and the primal, confronting visitors with the limits of the idea of “progress.”

Under the leadership of the young and enthusiastic pastor Rev. David Black, the church has embraced a progressive stance, and this exhibition could be seen as a testament to the limits of that progressiveness. It asks whether we can truly reconcile the base aspects of our humanity with the ideals of spiritual elevation.

On June 2nd, following the Sunday service, a panel discussion was held in the church sanctuary. However, rather than a traditional discussion, the audience witnessed an unexpected performance. Wu guided the panelists—poet Delia Pless, therapist Rob Meeker, and renowned artist Catherine Sullivan—in singing “Foregone Conclusion” by Pedro the Lion, a song significant to Yerxa during his youth. Yerxa himself was absent, but his influence was palpable throughout the event.

When asked for biographical information, Wu provided only a brief and cryptic statement:

“Qiuchen Wu is an artist and writer based in Chicago, IL. He has presented at venues including mn gallery, Logan Center for the Arts, The Lawn, ACRE, The Renaissance Society, and The First Presbyterian Church of Chicago. He holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Distinction from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Chicago. He is currently a Visual, Literary & Performing Arts Fellow at The Arts Club of Chicago.”

Yerxa, when approached, declined to provide biographical details, suggesting instead that he be viewed as material rather than the author of the exhibition—similar to how Socrates is not the author of Plato’s dialogues but rather the material from which they are derived.

Qiuchen Wu’s exhibition does not offer easy answers but instead challenges viewers to confront the complex interplay between identity, ownership, and the self in relation to others. By presenting these themes in the context of a sacred space, the exhibition pushes the boundaries of how we understand these relationships, making it not just an artistic display but a catalyst for deeper reflection.