2011
THE TURNER ARCHIVES
2010
BUT NATURE HAS NOT CHANGED
2001-2007
UNBALANCEDIMMIGRATION BODY TEMPORARY INSECURITY
HOW
ARE YOU?A
RESUMEFATIGUEFEAR
OF THE TINY SPACE
1997-2000
PULL
UP- 2 MARTYRDOMPULL
UP - 1MEASURE-2
MEMORY
. SYMBOL - 2MEMORY
. SYMBOL - 1MEASURE-1STUPID
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 The Turner Archives
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BUT NATURE HAS NOT CHANGED |
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| Photos: Willem Vermaase/ RijksakademieOPEN 2010 |
Yin-Ju Chen & James T. Hong | 3 min. 10 sec. | 3 channel video installation | loop | DVCPRO HD | color | stereo | 2010 |
This work is a personal and mediated survey of the natural habitat of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp in Poland.
From multiple angles, the camp is presented as a haven for a multitude of thriving flora, fauna, and tourists in a desolate
but beautiful landscape. Even though the horrors of the camp's past remain quiet within the ruins, intolerance still rears
its ugly head.
〈但，天性並無改變〉
三頻道錄像裝置｜二頻道立體聲｜三分十秒｜彩色｜英語對白｜中文字幕｜ HD｜2010
這件作品攝於波蘭奧許維茲集中營（二次大戰納粹德國所建最大的集中營，約三百萬人謀害於此），影像與對話呈現作者在集中營參觀的經驗，與對集中營環境的體驗與體會。 作品從多重角度捕捉朝氣蓬勃的生態、為數可觀的觀光客、嘻鬧的青少年，以及孤寂但美盛的集中營風景。這與印像中，或著可說與教課書裡或電影裡的學習經驗大相逕庭。
即便奧許維茲集中營的種族滅絕歷史仍安靜地深埋在其廢墟之中，這件作品揭露偏狹的種族歧視依然持續衍生他醜陋的一面。 |
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"But Nature Has Not Changed" is a 3-channel installation,
with each channel/video projected onto its own wall. The
placement and design of the 3 walls are customized to the
exhibition space itself. All of the images were filmed at
Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland. Each video has its own theme:
Video 1 - Animals thrive in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Sparrows are
rearing their next generations; frogs are mating, tadpoles are
swimming.
Video 2 - Spring in Auschwitz-Birkenau is ironically beautiful
and peaceful -- the flowing green grass, the flowers, the
clouds . . . . Maybe, for just a minute, one could stop thinking
about the horror that had taken place here.
Video 3 - Here the tourists, mostly teenagers, are learning an
important historical lesson about 20th century European
intolerance. But in the end, the Auschwitz-Birkenau museum
is host to a high-school-like confrontation about
discrimination and racism.
The three walls are designed to slowly flow spectators toward
subsequent walls, so they can see the narrative flow. Viewers
start at Video 1, move to Video 2, and then stop at Video 3.
Each video also contains a few short clips from the other two
videos.
Even though each video has its own story, they compliment
and interface with the other two. Education is a form of
rearing: where birds regurgitate to feed their young, people
educate. Auschwitz-Berkinau should educate. How could it
not? But these teenagers seemed to learn nothing, and had
their fun belittling people unlike themselves, below
themselves, on a beautiful spring day filled with nature in a
former death camp.
作品解說
〈但，天性並無改變〉是一件三頻道錄像裝置作品，每一頻道投影在各自獨立的牆面上。牆面的空間建構與投影的設置視展覽現場而定，所有影像皆攝於波蘭奧許維茲集中營。三個錄像畫面有各自的主題內容：
影像牆一：
集中營內的蓬勃的動物生態：麻雀在養育下一代；交配中的青蛙；蝌蚪優游自在的游泳。
影像牆二：
春季的奧許維茲集中營是如此的美盛與閒靜：波動的綠草與鮮花，以及頂上的藍天白雲。也許，僅僅一分鐘的時間，我們（遊客）忘卻了恐怖的歷史曾在這裡發生？
影像牆三：
這裡的觀光客大多是青少年，前來學習這發生於上一世紀最重要的歐洲歷史之一：種族偏狹與屠殺。但諷刺的是，最後奧許維茲集中營確演變成高中生嬉鬧（對有色人種的取笑）與觀光客咆哮的場地。
三道牆面的擺置讓觀者的瀏覽動線依序由牆一（蓬勃的動物生態）、牆二（自然景緻），到作為總結的牆三（青少年歧視有色人種），如此一來，觀者可逐步感受影像的敘事流。每一錄像頻道雖然有獨自的主題，但其中也交插剪輯其他兩個頻道的影像，讓三個畫面主體聯結更緊密：忙於繁殖與餵食幼雛的動物影射我們的後代－青少年；嬉鬧取笑有色人種的青少年、憤怒的旅客（作品中的第一人稱）、動物的生態發展，事件地點卻是擁有美麗春季的奧許維茲集中營。
教育是滋養的形式之一；雀鳥們忙於飼養下一代，人們則不停的學習。奧許維茲集中營本是後代學習的所在，怎能不呢？但作品中的青少年（我們的下一代）似乎沒不以為然，在美好的春日，在二十世紀的死亡集中營，嘻笑歡鬧並且歧視長像不同的人 。
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UNBALANCED
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Video Installation/Mixed-Media (TV,
video, stereos, amplifier, DVD player, wires, and power strip), 2007
This work is designed for "2nd Garage Biannual - Wunderkammer "(May/2007). The installation has one TV monitor and two speakers placed on the right and left sides of the monitor. When a speaker makes sound or noise, the parrakeet runs away to the opposite deirection, and the video also tilts.
The noise is mixed with lots of sounds recorded from garages, including engine starting, garage door openning, car alarms, ...etc. The sound are stereo(right and left), and the image of the parakeet moves right to left or left to right based on which speaker is making noise. See video clip.
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IMMIGRATION
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Mixed media (live ants, soil, white chocolate, fish tank), 20"x10.5"x12", collaboration with James T. Hong, 2004
People are afraid of the rising tide of
color, and the changing demographics, but nothing can, and
nothing will change the movement of peoples. Even terrorists
are immigrants, albeit destructive ones. Migration is fact;
immigration is destiny.
The disappearance of White America could
mean the end of the United States of America as we have known
it. The West could be reduced to Europe and few lightly populated
overseas European settler countries. Without America, the
West becomes a miniscule and declining part of the world’s
population on a small and inconsequential peninsula at the
extremity of the Eurasian land mass. This is projection as
truth.
White America will change inexorably,
and we will change as God watches.
"...The works exhibited
a steadfast individualism as well as a commitment to difficult
subject matter, including Americanism and cultural migration
processes. Artists Yin-Ju Chen and James T. Hong presented
Immigration, a mixed media piece that utilized live red ants
making their home in the dirt of a small-scale, ivory colored
America encased in a glass tank. Sophisticated and removed
to the point of parody, Chen and Hong captured scattered and
loosely bound concepts of home, America, separation, significance
of space and assimilation, while leaving no certain departure
or arrival points ..."
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By Ptera Bibeau, NY ARTS
The
San Francisco Bay Guardian |
BODY
TEMPORARY |
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Video Installation, 2003
This work focuses on the temporal
and cyclical moments of an animal’s body – from the inside
to the outside. In other words, the earth is ingested, digested,
and then returned to the Earth.
A moving image of
a cow excreting will be projected right into the interior
of the toilet. The audio will be of excreta dropping. Two
speakers will be hidden in the corners. |
INSECURITY |
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Mix Media 45 Pictures, (3 x 3
inch / each), 2003
This piece reflects our paranoiac society, where in each picture a set of eyes peers at the viewer. Since the motivation of the eyes is unstated, the act of looking at you becomes an end in itself.
To paraphrase Nietzsche, when you look into the abyss, it stares
back at you.
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HOW
ARE YOU? |
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Mix Media Mix Media(Video
loop, Tape recorder,...etc.)/ 2003
The idea is to reverse the typical power relationship between
human and pet bird, where birds are taught to speak the language
of humans through interminable repetition. Here the human is
trying to mimic the birds, and with some difficulty. The constant
chirping of the recorder forces the mouth to "parrot" the noises.
Just as it is unnatural for the parroting human, perhaps it
is unnatural for the bird to speak human language. |
A
RESUME |
Mix Media(Paper,
Frame,...etc.)/ 2003
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A big "fuck you."
Read the whole thing and take it seriously.
 READ |
FATIGUE |
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Mix Media(Slide Projector,
Desk, Chair, ... etc.)/ 2002
In this installation, the spectator becomes
the participant. He or she experiences the piece in the
same position as the subject represented in the slides:
namely sitting down and resting his or her chin on a pillow.
Here the feeling of boredom that one might feel in a museum
or gallery is incarnated. In other words, the physical act
of being-bored is an essential part of the installation’s
design. See detail
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FEAR OF THE TINY SPACE Mix
Media Paper, desk, lamp,...etc. 2001 |
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PULL
UP- 2 |
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Transpanrency,
Image out put 2000
I hope
the viewers can feel the anxiety caused by these pictures. Between
the work and the viewers, the viewers would have shocked and uncomfortable
experiences that were similar to mine in the period of the work production.
The four pictures of pulled-up thumbnails were the output of transparent
sticker. They were stuck on the sliding windows of the second floor
in Leisure Art Center, where happened to face the crossroad of Chung-Shan
North road, one of the busy crossroads in Taipei.
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MARTYRDOM |
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Mix
Media(Spacimen of Mosquitoes, Neon Light, etc...) 2000
A rectangular white rack with the electron tube of neon. The collected
dead mosquitoes were positioned in this rack.
I killed mosquitoes when
they were biting me. I collected all those mosquitoes
that were killed, and regarded them as the deceased of worship.
Simultaneously, the behind of the work expressed that I, as an artist,
had a monotonous life at that time. |
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PULL
UP - 1 |
 Photographic
Paper,Image Out put 2000
It hurts! |
MEASURE-2 |
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Graph
paper, Tracer, ...etc. 1999
Tracing some parts of human bodies on the grid papers without accurate
proportion, and hanging the papers on the wall with frames.
Continuing the same topic, but this work is much more subjective.
I fabricate the measurement that is similar to the established units
to emphasize the existence of the subjective and individual, and the
international acknowledged measurement is ironically positioned nest
to the papers. However, which one is the "Truth"? The comments of
the spectators are diverse; your discourse and mine, and even the
discourse of the person concerned (he or she maybe lie), none of them
can be promised to be true. |
Memory
. Symbol - 2 |
  Trace
paper, Ink, Timber,...etc. 1999
Piling up the tracing papers on the bookrack.
Continuing the same topic, I attempt to express the hysterical condition of every second in every moment in the form
of stack. |
Memory
. Symbol - 1 |
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Trace
paper, Ink, Timber,...etc. 1999
Keying some symbols in the computer files, then printing on tracing
papers and sticking them on the walls. There are 12 pieces
of papers in total.
No matter the public conversation or the private diary, or even the
silent meditation, people seem to be surrounded and repressed by words
and messages. This work explores the feeling of helplessness. The symbol (ex. a
point) can be the minimal unit of language. I use computer to make
the symbol mechanical, statistical, and present this work in the form
of a diary and documentation. |
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MEASURE-1 |
  
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Graph
paper, Tracer, ...etc. 1998Trace the sketch of the face on the grid papers; write down the measurement
of every part of the face and hang them on the wall with frames.
It expresses the ambiguity of the subjective and objective. "Gossip"
is the brief vocabulary that represents the work. It designates that
when people receive the incomplete messages with their perception,
they would still delete some messages that they do not think necessary,
and re-examine the messages according to their instant emotions and
consciousness. In this process, "Truth" is destined to be lost. This
work does not strive to judge the right and wrong, but tries to stimulate
the thinking about humanity. |
STUPID |
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Red
Sticker, 1997
Carving the word "stupid" on the acrylic stickers and paste them on
the walls, floors and glasses in the North and South gallery. Each word
is 30x110 cm.
It is stupid. |
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