Zurich 2023
ZHdK, Fine Art Project Space
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5 - 6 October 2023
Participating institutions
Chung-Ang University – CAU – Seoul
Institut Teknologi Bandung – ITB – Bandung
Parsons School of Design – New York
Yale NUS College – Singapore
Zurich University of the Arts – ZHdK – Switzerland
Swetlana Heger, Pascal Sidler, Eleni Barmpa, Leonardo Fajardo, Yoo Ra Hong, Massimiliano Rossetto and Mambo Peiran Wang
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Yang Yung Wei and Gustav Hellberg
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Mercedes Fernandez, Trenton Teinert, Jim Ramer and MARIEVIC
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Syafiqa Salma Hanindyari, Nabila Yasmin, Deden Hendan Durahman and Azizah Syafir
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Jia Ying Lee, Hei Kiu and Christoff Draeger
Artworks
Yang Yung Wei and Gustav Hellberg (CAU, Seoul)
Interrupted
Video installation based on an idea by Yang Yung Wei. It is a collaboration between Yang Yung Wei and Gustav Hellberg.
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Installation: 1 channel video installation, video projection, audio, two freely moving mirrors (hanging from wires attached to the ceiling)
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Video: 1 channel, HD, 00: 02:34:00
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In the video installation Interrupted viewers are confronted with Yang Yung Wei’s observations of being extant in a no man’s land between different languages and corresponding cultures. A video projection on a wall shows Wei’s handwritten text as she is writes down her thoughts. The text is mainly written in traditional Chinese, Mandarin is We’s mother tongue. Some times Korean and English text appears. Those are the two languages that have become her primary languages, as she has moved away from her home country Taiwan. The soundtrack consists of Wei’s voice reading fragments of the text in English, Chinese and Korean. The audio channels have been layered and slightly repositioned to exude a notion of languages’ lack of communication certainty. Between the video projector and the wall, two mirrors are hanging from the wall. The mirrors are blocking the projection, casting a shadow on the wall. They also cast a reflexion of the projection. Viewers are invited to rotate the mirrors to readjust image fragments of the video projection. In this act viewers are blocking the projection further. Text fragments are projected to their bodies.
Reading the images is akin to stepping into Wei’s visual journal, yet the overlapping dialogues obscure complete comprehension. The shifts in imagery and sound contained within language become the focal points she intends to convey, rather than the meanings inherent in the words themselves. Stripped from the confines of language's system, examining language from a different perspective might offer a wholly new experience – a perceptual journey beyond context.
Yang Yung Wei and Gustav Hellberg
Video: Gustav Hellberg
Video still
Photo: Gustav Hellberg
Photo: Gustav Hellberg
Photo: Gustav Hellberg
Jiaying Lee and Hei Kiu (YALE/NUS, SIngapore)
The Auction
Auctions are the pinnacle of commercialization in the art world – a stage where the value of objects is manipulated and human desires are magnified.
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The term “auction” dates back to the Latin root “augere,” which means “to increase.” Although auctions today predominantly involve the competitive bidding of objects, the disturbing history of auctioning off women and slaves as commodities cannot be ignored. Despite humanity’s apparent “progress” through industrialization and human rights advancements, it is ironic that modern slavery persists today within the global supply chain, fueled by capitalism and consumerism.
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The Auction delves into the dark undercurrents of consumerism and its parallels with historical exploitation, while shedding light on contemporary issues such as mass production, environmental degradation, and the global supply chain’s socio-political impact. Through the deliberate orchestration of a limited-time auction event, we challenge society to question the artificial value assigned to objects and provoke critical reflection on the absurdity of the current consumerist culture.
Photo: Hei Kiu
Photo: Trenton Teinert
Mercedes Fernandez, Trenton Teinert, Jim Ramer and MARIEVIC
(Parsons School of Design)
He was utterly transfixed […], he was a photograph
This project is a reflexion on authorship, an examination of systems and conventions that structure image making.
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We’ve put in place a hybrid dialogue. It started with one of us feeling utterly transfixed by a sculpture. This point of departure inspired a fragmented narrative full of gaps, enjambments and dislocations. In this textual fabric, the self among us disintegrated. We rejected a parent-like relationship between us and the work. Our gesture figured the death of the author by letting image learning take control of our narrative. AI manufactured the visual archive of our written discussion. It presented us with mirrors: an embrace of our dialogue that no longer represented our specific words or desires. In our project, the visible no longer expresses affects. Instead, our voices served as a conduit through which systems of images flowed.
Photo: Trenton Teinert
Eleni Barmpa, Leonardo Fajardo, Yoo Ra Hong, Massimiliano Rossetto and Mambo Peiran Wang (Zurich University of the Arts)
Manuals for Individuals
Each participant created a “manual”, which was then randomly assigned to another member of the group through a lottery.
The assignments varied in nature, encompassing themes from the humorous and poetic to the socially conscious, and were put into an artistic practice.
Eleni Barmpa for Leonardo Fajardo
Massimiliano Rossetto for Yoo Ra Hong
Peiran Wang for Eleni Barmpa
Yoo Ra Hong for Swetlana Heger
Leonardo Fajardo for Peiran Wang
Swetlana Heger for Massimiliano Rossetto
Photo: Gustav Hellberg
Photo: Gustav Hellberg
Deden Hendan Durahman, Azizah Syafira, Nabila Yasmin Nurrita, Syafiqa Salma Hanindyari and Hei Kiu Au (Bandung Institute of Technology, Indonesia YALE/NSU, Singapore)
Photo: Deden Hendan Durahman
Mandala: A Visual Odyssey
This project focuses on expressing our perspective as artists in a new unfamiliar landscape. As we immerse ourselves, we instinctively capture moments that may seem trivial to locals but take on a profound spiritual significance for us. However, beyond the amazement, there also lingers unsettling emotions in our encounter with ‘the new’.
We compose pictures that we took during our stay in Zurich in the form of mandalas; a dynamic form of artistic expression, presented in the medium of photography. As it relates to certain religious beliefs and is often associated as meditative, we borrow its language to represent how we try to find solace in a new environment that often brings a strong sense of alienation; turning it into an opportunity for self-discovery.
Bandung Institute of Technology, Indonesia