A ceremony can be of various themes. Celebration, commendation meeting, or funeral. I tried to use this neutral and imaginative concept as a container to show and explore some depressive phenomena under the Chinese education system. This work is composed of three parts:
The first part is a huge digitally printed picture named Ah. The scene in this picture is a very common ceremony of throwing books in China. Graduates will throw away textbooks and test papers after the final exam which means the ending of the high-stress school life of at least twelve years( from elementary school to high school), as a carnival of celebrating freedom and venting. The school filled with falling papers and crazy people seem to be performing a ritual through which the teens try to purity oneself and seek liberation. In this process, the books seem to be a subjection of the students’ body. However, after being excessively deprived of freedom and dignity by school and examinations, this level of "suicide" is more like a noisy sigh.
The second part of my work is also called Ah. I used several different materials such as iron wire, plaster and tulle, trying to create a completely ideal and soulized creature from the bone to the flesh and then to the skin. It is the indestructible thing left after when the student group is drawn out of study and examination, drawn out of compelling obedience, and drawn out of patriotic education. It could be love, liberty, sincerity or any other things being chased by a young strong growing spirit. Its transparent body crawls on the ground, exuding fragrant white wine body fluids. If the tone of the first part Ah is like a rueful response to the scene of fallen. Then the second Ah is more similar to a long exhalation. The sculpture is built up with the softness and temperature of flesh. It’s fragile but indestructible.
The third part is called the student who doesn’t play the piano seriously and the principal who is speaking. I used a red velvet chair, a chinese ceremonial music recreated with electronic synthesizer and some poetry cards settled as invitation cards to echo the theme of a ceremony. I try to connect and soften the clear intentions of the other two parts, and push the atmosphere of the entire space to a more ambiguous and absurd situation. This is an attempt to mix materials of different textures and attributes and to stimulate the senses (visual, auditory, and taste) from multiple aspects.
The poetry:
ciò che sembra superficiale
è carne e ossa per noi.
Per gli altri noi stessi
siamo qualcosa di superfluo?
Sembra che ci siano rumori provenienti
dal fondo del lago.
Poi a risentire, il silenzio.
