Ai Jing, Chinese contemporary artist, singer-songwriter and author, from Shenyang, Liaoning province. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Walking, in Ai's practice, is not merely a metaphor but a methodology. From Shenyang to Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Guangdong province, Shenzhen, and Hong Kong, and onward to Tokyo, New York, London, and Milan, her physical journeys mirror an ongoing inner search.

"I express, communicate, and share what I feel through music and visual art during this process," she says. "We are all still walking. No one has definitive answers."

This idea is echoed in the exhibition's design. Through shifts in light, openness and spatial rhythm, from intimacy and expansiveness to gravity, the show guides viewers through an emotional landscape that parallels Ai's own trajectory.

Museum director Yan Weixin describes "walking" as the methodological core of Ai's art. "If walking forms the horizontal axis of space, then love and strength form the vertical axis of emotion," he says. "Together, they structure the exhibition."

For Yan, the significance of the show also lies in Ai's interdisciplinary language. Having transitioned from a celebrated music career to visual art, she integrates multiple media into a multisensory form of expression that resists categorization.