costumed performance with plastic mask, foam nose, plastic ball and white cloth among an installation of paper feathers accompanied by a found soundtrack, 60 minutes.
performed at Royal College of Art, curated by Contemporary Art Practice (Performance), 2019.
performed for the second time at Theatre Academy, Helsinki, Finland for LAPSody, curated by Live Art and Performance Studies, 2019.
photo documentation by Wan Songkun.
video documentation by Chuwen Wang.
https://vimeo.com/313632004
https://vimeo.com/313632015
https://vimeo.com/313632025
translated into Could play no more (study of Hyacinth), pencil drawing, photographs and clear tapes on paper, 25x40cm, series of 7, 2019.
“I don’t see any manna, don’t you want children?”
EXODUS 11 (NIV)
About midnight [God] will go throughout Egypt.
5 Every firstborn son ... will die, ...
6 There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt—
worse than there has ever been or ever will be again.
There was not a house without someone dead haunts the firstborn son by forcefully revisiting childhood nightmares.
A masculine-looking figure is present in a space scattered with individually hand-crafted origami feathers. His limited vision is blocked by what seems to suggest a child-like and comical interpretation of the 17th century’s plague doctors with a black ball foam attached to its beak. He is tripedal with his toes, heel and knee, disorienting his physical fulcrum that results in sporadic trembles. Like a stork delivering newborns, with his mouth he bites onto a semi-transparent white cloth with an inflated ball in it, as if it were an embryo. His action is almost singular as he repeatedly pushes the soccer ball as it subtly become visible through the cloth, yet gives an impression of the sphere about to perturb through it. It also an attempt to create a suspended animation as if the ball was an imaginary energy sphere or hadouken released from his body. He is dressed in plain white long sleeve and briefs, as if he were an adolescent ready for bed. Surrounding the room is an audio soundscape of a looping sound effect of a stadium crowd cheering or even jeering.
The movement work which is very much dependent on the performer’s physical dexterity is a reaction towards an amalgamation of fears that are rooted from the artist’s personal childhood trauma, two of which are Sunday school’s tale of the tenth plague of Egypt as well as his fear of soccer balls. The performance-installation attempts to create a landscape of trepidation, where fear is projected and challenged throughout the duration of the work.
“I don’t see any manna, don’t you want children?”