2020, Shenzhen, China
Window of the World
Found objects, wood board, wheels, string, glue
31 x 80 x 21 inch
Site specific work for The Window of the World theme park, Shenzhen, China
Exhibited in Unravel: An Anti-Exhibition, curated by RISD Museum Guild, RISD Museum, Providence
It is about the city of Shenzhen, about the light, about the city sinking to immerse in the night. Everything can happen when night falls in Shenzhen. I love the material life
and the illusion it creates with my desire. I love every corner of it, the buildings that kiss each other and the coastline. This work documents my feelings for the city. It’s a
romantic thinking and exploration of wandering as an identity in modern society and in this southern immigrant city. 关于游离在现代社会的身份和浪漫化的想象.
This is a site-specific installation/performance work. It all happens inside the park in the city center. The park called “Window of the World” is a theme park built around 1999. It contains replicas of famous/iconic architecture and sculptures in miniature forms. Its goal is to ensure you travel around the world in just one day. For the local workers who have never been abroad, it provides a sense of escape and fantasy. The park is being curated through a very Chinese sense of order and perspective. Where Chinese culture is surrounded and held by all the other foreign architectures. The park is full of preconceived cultural framework, Chinese worldview, and education of a sense of Chinese identity. It is full of constructed identities for the lower class, middle class by the government, representing the worldview of Chinese people. The park displays modernity and internationality. By taking photos with the cultural icons, tourists are able to emphasize that “I’ve been here,” escaping from space and time.
I made a site-specific installation for the park. The site is about an action I take the giraffes out of the park and take a walk with the giraffes outside /around the park. Sneaking out the giraffes at night and walking them across the street. Documenting this performance through video. I love these giraffes because these sculptures have been standing in the “African Savannah” for decades, and I witnessed their vicissitudes. I can still remember that I first met them next to the Ancient Egypt Pyramids when I was little. Visiting them again last year, I felt a sense of nostalgia. There are many little objects in this park secretly decaying without being noticed. I want to bring them out. Like narratives in many children’s books, animals are escaping the zoo. Where will they go?