MATDOT Art Center is pleased to present The Unbearable Lightness, a solo exhibition by Taiwanese artist Ya-Chu Kang, current artist-in-residence at MATDOT Art Center in December 2025. The exhibition brings together key works from Kang’s ongoing Hemp Research Project, focusing on Chapters II and III, which investigate the material, cultural, and political dimensions of hemp, cannabis, flax, and related fibres. Her practice draws on field research across Thailand and Europe, tracing how labour, ecology, and memory intertwine across geographies. Chapter II features two single-channel videos—The Path of Hemp and In Present of Cannabis—filmed across Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Bangkok, and Thailand’s southern islands. Together, they present a dual narrative that reflects the evolving social and symbolic identities of these plants, as well as the embodied knowledge embedded in processes of harvesting, spinning, weaving, and dyeing. Developed in France, Chapter III expands Kang’s inquiry into the intertwined histories of hemp and flax, revealing how human labour alters both the body and the natural environment. Across sculptures, tapestries, collages, and embroidered works, she reinterprets gestures of twisting, binding, and interlacing as metaphors for contemporary conditions—touching on identity, migration, resilience, and the structures that bind societies together. Through these material investigations, The Unbearable Lightness proposes new ways of perceiving the relationships between body, environment, and time. Kang’s multidisciplinary practice—rooted in anthropology, ecology, and textile knowledge—invites viewers to reconsider how histories and futures are woven.