Man Yau (b. 1991, Finland) is a sculptor and installation artist based in Helsinki, Finland. Yau’s work departs from a deep understanding of materials — how they came to be, across which stretches of time and by whom they were valued, and the ways in which their references may be projected onto ideas and persons today. Gripping onto the memories embedded within a material, Yau works to turn it inside out, revealing the heartbeat underneath. Her material choices shift fluidly across glass, silk ribbons, metal, ceramic, stone, wood, and graphic work, yet each is carefully considered and chosen for its associations — used as a language to explore the feeling of “being on display and under pressure,” approached from the perspective of a woman who is visibly of a minority background.
Yau’s practice often investigates the performative quality of identity through the visual language of orientalism in western frames of reference. A reoccurring motif in her work is Chinoiserie: a decorative style collapsing undefined Chinese, Japanese, and Indian aesthetics into a single surface. This serves as an emblem of the mechanics of exoticisation, with its distorted copies, and mass-produced artefacts of capitalism. Drawing on appropriated aesthetics, references to representations of women in art history, and combing her own history as a woman, Yau creates refracting layers to her works. Though springing from a critical perspective of exoticisation, her works are alluring. The critique does not present itself through the twisting or destruction of the aesthetics employed, but rather in the discomfort the works emanate. In Yau’s work, the role of the viewer is central; Many of her sculptures carry within them the sensation of interaction and precarity. Sculptures that take the form of wearables guide the viewer through tortuous or impossible acts of wearing, in which either the object or the wearer is inescapably sacrificed in their meeting. This imagined use of the object acts as a material in and of itself, the space between viewer and work echoing a network of meanings.
With an explorative yet precise approach, Yau works decidedly hands-on. She takes each piece from start to finish across a process that can span months or years, regenerating works in conversation with one another. After long periods of planning, a finishing arrives — tools become extensions of her body, and she enters a trance of intuition. The resulting works hold a highly disciplined visual grammar, set on a knife’s edge: precarious and delicate, easily destroyed by a single unconscious brush. This fragility meets processes of aggressive forming — metalwork, glass cutting, the firing of a ceramic kiln. These contrasts and references create rich installations and sculptural works, unfolding generously the longer one looks.
Man Yau received her MFA from The Academy of Fine Arts, University of the Arts Helsinki in 2023 after earning an MA in Design at Aalto University in Finland. She has presented solo exhibitions at Turku Art Museum (FI, forthcoming 2026); BOY konsthall (SE); and Helsinki Art Museum (HAM) (FI). In 2025 she was awarded Young Artist of the Year 2025 by the City of Tampere, and staged a solo exhibition at Tampere Art Museum in conjunction. Yau has also presented work widely around the world, including at the Performa Biennial 2023, New York City (US); Temnikova & Kasela, Tallinn (EE); Margot Samel, New York City (US); Pitted Dates (FI); Galleri F15, Moss, (NO); American Museum of Ceramic Art (AMOCA), Pomona (US); Cité internationale des arts, Paris (FR); Sinne, Helsinki (FI); Riga Contemporary (LV); Finnish National Gallery for Contemporary Art Kiasma (FI); Vantaa Art Museum Artsi (FI); Kunsthalle Helsinki (FI); Konstepidemin, Gothenburg (SE); 198 CAL, London (UK); Galerie de l’Institut finlandais, Paris (FR); Révélations Biennale, Paris (FR); Space for Free Arts, Helsinki (FI); Seoul Museum of Art (KR).
Yau’s work is represented in the collections of The State Art Commission (FI); Miettinen collection (FI); Aalto University Executive Education Collection (FI); Helsinki Art Museum (HAM) (FI); Finnish National Gallery; Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma Collection (FI); Saastamoinen Foundation Art Collection, EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art (FI); Shigaraki Ceramic Cultural Park Art Collection (JP); Finnish Art Society; Art Lottery (2019, 2022); Tampere Art Museum (FI); Rafaela Seppälä Collection; Tiftö Foundation (FI)‚ as well as a permanent public work for the City of Helsinki (FI) and numerous private collections.
