[1] Yan Xing is known for his interdisciplinary projects which have built a complex, compelling body of work that reflects critically on how history is manufactured today.

[3] Yan Xing's works involve an extremely broad range of media, including performance, video, photography, installation, and painting, among others.

[4] Yan Xing's career in art began with Daddy Project (2011),[5] it was an hour-long performance he gave an account of his absent “father”.

The work was first performed in a group exhibition curated by Carol Yinghua Lu, art critic Holland Cotter wrote in the New York Times: “First-person public exposure of a personal life, particularly related to family, is relatively rare in China, and Mr. Yan has become a controversial star.”[6] The first institutional solo exhibition of his works was held on 2012 at Chinese Arts Centre, Manchester, UK;[7] On 2016, his first solo exhibition in America opened at Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan.

[8] From June 2 through August 27, 2017, the Kunsthalle Basel presented Yan Xing: Dangerous Afternoon, curated by Elena Filipovic, this was the artist's first institutional solo exhibition in Switzerland.