Cosmic point | Li Yuan-chia, at Kettle’s Yard

Li Yuan-chia, Untitled, 1993, hand-coloured black and white print. Courtesy Li Yuan-chia Foundation.

In 1970 the Chinese experimental artist Li Yuan-chia moved from London to the village of Banks, in Cumbria, just north of Hadrian’s Wall.

His motive? To single-handedly convert a derelict farmhouse he had bought from Winifred Nicholson, with money borrowed from friends, into an art centre, turning cowsheds into galleries, and creating a children’s art area, a communal kitchen, a printing press room, a 60-seat performance space, and a communal garden.

Despite its remote location, the LYC Museum & Gallery became one of the most vibrant art spaces in the country, its galleries exhibiting four artists every month – more than 320 over its ten-year existence – from internationally famous stars (Ben Nicholson, Winifred Nicholson, Barbara Hepworth, Paul Nash) to local and emerging artists, some of whom would go on to achieve international recognition (Andy Goldsworthy, David Nash, Lygia Clark). The LYC became a magnet for hitch-hiking art students, and provided a stimulating stop-off point for culturally minded hikers walking the wall.

Li was an accomplished artist in his own right, a ‘visual philosopher’ who experimented with different media including ink painting, calligraphy, kinetic sculpture, installation, conceptualism, photography and performance. His work often centred around the ‘cosmic point’ – both the beginning and the end of creation – which manifested in different forms, from tiny ink dots to magnetised objects moved around on metal discs.

Orphaned in the Chinese Civil War, he was central to Taiwan’s first abstractionist movement, Ton Fan, before moving to Bologna in 1962 where he co-founded the group ‘Il Punto’, with Antonio Calderara and Kengiro Azuma. And then on to London, from 1966, where he exhibited at the Lisson Gallery with, among others, Yoko Ono and Derek Jarman.

Cumbria, however, became his home: having founded the LYC, he never returned to the capital again. After he was forced to close the gallery in 1983, he continued to live and work in the complex, developing an idiosyncratic style of hand-tinted photography. He died in 1993, and is buried in nearby Lanercost Priory, his grave still visited by aficionados.

Kettle’s Yard, in Cambridge, recognising a shared ethos with LYC Museum and Gallery, are running the exhibition Making New Worlds: Li Yuan-chia & Friends, from November 11 to February 18, marking the profound impact the artist’s idiosyncratic Cumbrian venture had on 20th-century British art. Li’s own work, from his early ink paintings to his late photography, is exhibited alongside pieces by the likes of Nicholson, Nash and Hepworth. Li influenced contemporary artists Aaron Tan (Singapore), Grace Ndiritu (UK) and Charwei Tsai (Taiwan) are also featured.