A painted letter to America: Kristy Chan makes her New York solo debut

Sean Kelly opened Kristy Chan’s first solo exhibition in New York. Short Letter, Long Farewell presents a new body of paintings and drawings that meditate on movement, longing, and the quiet intensity of everyday experience. Born in Hong Kong and living in London, Kristy Chan approaches America as both a real and imagined place. The exhibition takes its title from Peter Handke’s novel Short Letter, Long Farewell, and unfolds as a reflective letter to America, the promise of renewal, and the uncertainty that shadows new beginnings. In Handke’s book, America is a place where the possibility of a new life exists alongside the remnants of an old one, a tension that resonates throughout Chan’s work. Several artworks in the exhibition draw directly from literature and cultural memory