Exhibition

Xiaohuan also makes his refusal explicit: even the name Xiaohuan itself carries a sense of plain, unperformed joy—something as grounded as soil, as natural as breathing, as present as the quiet happiness one feels while painting. Bu Huan(“Not Joy”) is not negativity nor resistance, but a gesture of refusal, a kind of stability: a simple rejection of the expectation that one “ought to be happy.” It recalls Walser’s notions of “non-action” and “withdrawal,” yet Hei Er Bu Huan (“The son is not joyful”) signals a refusal to cooperate: he does not choose to step away, he situates his life between the everyday and the canvas.