“VIOLET SERIES III”: This painting by Wanyu Guo is featured in “Delayed Choice: Chinese New-Generation Female Artists,” on view through November 22 at the Numina Gallery at Princeton High School. The exhibit showcases works by 18 women artists trained at the Central Academy of Fine Arts and the Academy of Arts and Design of Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.

On view through November 22 at the Numina Gallery at Princeton High School (PHS), 151 Moore Street, “Delayed Choice: Chinese New-Generation Female Artists” is an exhibition of original fine art by 18 women artists trained at the Central Academy of Fine Arts and the Academy of Arts and Design of Tsinghua University in Beijing, China. It is the first group exhibition of young female Chinese artists in the United States.

The exhibition, which celebrates the 40th anniversary of formal U.S.-China diplomatic relations, showcases work by Jia Chu, Rui Feng, Tianshu Gong, Wanyu Guo, Nan Hu, Yanhe Liu, Ying Liu, Yiran Wang, Yu Wang, Yujing Wang, Huanpan Xie, Huichao Yang, Huimin Yang, Wen Zhang, Zijia Zhang, Qinyu Zheng, and Qianyin Zhuo.

The artists play with the concept of time and tradition. The exhibition demonstrates traditional Chinese art forms while integrating more contemporary Western styles. Each artist intertwines ideas of society, gender, and culture in their work, providing a relevant new perspective for a modern international and intercultural world.

These young female artists explore femininity in their work. What has it meant in the past to be a woman in China, and what does it mean now? How have women been depicted, celebrated, obscured, mythologized, and reshaped by the interpretive eyes and hands of artists? How do those traditions and archetypes affect this new generation of Chinese women?

Through each artist’s recognition and understanding of their cultural past and their acknowledgment of their cultural present, their work helps shape their future, further defining their identity as women in society in our diverse global culture. Their work intimately explores the feminine, defining femininity in new ways while integrating past ideologies about female identity.

A group of students at PHS manages the Numina Gallery. Numina, Latin for “sacred space,” was the first student-run professional nonprofit art gallery in the nation. Princeton High School students played an integral role in curating the exhibition, working alongside Princeton High School art teachers, as well as trained art historians and museum professionals from World Arts Education Corporation.

A traveling version of the exhibition, featuring a selection of artists, will appear at the Anderson Contemporary Gallery in New York City from December 2 to January 1, 2020.

The Numina Gallery show is open to the public Monday through Thursday 3:30 to 8 p.m. and Friday 3:30 to 6 p.m.