…The vision of China represented in this exhibition is, as its title suggests, still a romantic and fanciful one, though more actively engaged and critical than its antecedents. Moments of darker realities do pierce through uncomfortably, with Helen Couchman’s paper works commenting on the changes in Beijing’s built environment and Gayle Chong Kwan’s detached observation of the deserted English-style satellite town outside Shanghai. …

Gigi Chang was assistant curator of China Design Now at the Victoria and Albert museum.

Crafts. Nov/Dec 2008

www.helencouchman.com/portfolio-items/new-work