‘No Worries, My Mother Is Next Door’
- Artist: Xiyadie
- Date: 2017
- Medium: Paper
- Dimensions: support: 296 × 297 mm
- Museum: Tate Modern
- Collection record: Tate Modern website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the ‘No Worries, My Mother Is Next Door’ by Xiyadie. The 2017 paper cut is part of a small series that playfully flips China’s ancient papercutting tradition. Xiyadie takes the crisp white xuanzhi paper—used in calligraphy—and paints the cuts with bright food colours you’d see on the bao buns sold on street stalls. The design is a tiny square that looks like a delicate red cut‑out of plants and animals, but if you look closer you’ll see it’s actually a stylised, almost comic‑book depiction of two men in an intimate pose, hidden beneath the surface. It’s a bit of a Trojan horse: the surface looks familiar, but the subtext challenges the stigma around queer love in contemporary China. The artist, a former farmer turned queer artist, has used this medium to critique class and identity politics. The work sits alongside other squares from 2001 to 2017, all echoing that playful yet provocative visual language. It’s a subtle, powerful reminder that art can mask meaning while still daring to speak.
See it in person
‘No Worries, My Mother Is Next Door’ is in the collection of Tate Modern on Bankside, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
