Although the primary stakeholders of this research are Chinese women, the interventions conducted in the UK have attracted participants from diverse cultural backgrounds. Their feedback revealed that the installation not only reflects the conditions of Chinese women within the institution of marriage, but also resonates with the shared pressures faced by women across societies.
During the exhibition, I invited participants from China, Singapore, Korea, the UK, and Canada to step into the installation. Without prior explanation, they encountered the red threads and hair through touch, movement, and stillness — each forming a silent conversation between their cultural memories and embodied emotions.
Audience Feedback:
These responses revealed how emotion transcends cultural background. Participants from East Asian contexts perceived the red thread as a symbol of confinement and destiny, while Western participants resonated with the softness and vulnerability of the hair. This demonstrates how bodily experience and material symbolism can serve as a universal emotional language.
Initially, I thought the work belonged solely to the Chinese context — a reflection of women bound by familial and social expectations. Yet when a British viewer described feeling “ritual and solemnity,” I realised that marriage, gender, and the body are shared concerns across societies. Each woman meets her own “red thread” — as fate, duty, or tenderness.
Academically, this feedback supports my assumption of embodied empathy: people can connect emotionally through sensory engagement, even without shared language or cultural background. Here, art functions as a form of cultural translation, transforming physical materials into emotional bridges.
Ultimately, I realised that art is not only a way to expose structural oppression but also a means to cultivate understanding. When women from different worlds stand before the same red thread, touch it, pause, and feel — they are, in that moment, connected through empathy.
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