The mountains of Wuhan

After one year of the coronavirus pandemic (peak of the first wave of infections at the beginning of March 2020), the ceiling painting “The Mountains of Wuhan” was presented to the public. In the underground hall of the Leipzig-Markt railway station, on the arched concrete beams, the “Mountains of Wuhan” appear shadowy, engulfed in mist. The shapes of these mountains and landscapes correspond to the style of traditional Chinese landscape painting.

This reference to Chinese culture not only addresses the supposed origin of the virus, but also the Daoist world view, which emphatically emphasises the balance between man and nature. At the same time, the bizarre landscapes are reminiscent of the mountainous shapes of the infection progression curves, and the location itself is also directly related to the global pandemic: the global mobility that mankind claims for itself and its goods always provides unwelcome passengers with the best travelling conditions.

In the station concourse, the “mountains of Wuhan” appear to passers-by like strange, mysterious clouds above their heads. But at the same time, as seen from the marketplace above the concourse, they are also invisible root systems that spread invisibly beneath the everyday human life that still seems normal and right to us.