She Left a Mark, Not a Metaphor

‘She Left a Mark, Not a Metaphor’ is a participatory installation that challenges the enduring association of women with flowers in Chinese culture. Drawing on research into tomb imagery, the project reveals how floral metaphors — particularly the peony — have historically reduced women’s identities to aesthetic and social ideals.

In response, the project proposes a new visual language grounded in lived experience. Based on interviews with 20 women, fragments of their personal stories are transformed into hand-carved stone stamps — objects traditionally used in China to represent name and authority. Stone, with its weight and permanence, becomes a medium to assert memory, identity and resistance.

The installation invites visitors to stamp these carvings onto flower petals, creating a growing archive of marks that speak against symbolic violence. In this space, women are not reduced to flowers — they leave lasting traces, etched in stone.