After the first “Project Space · Young Curators’ Lab” – “When the Form Does Not Become an Attitude: Biology Meets Contemporary Art”, curated by Wei Ying and “The Liver” curated by Li Shengzhao were successfully held, the third session of the project entitled “An All-Encompassing All Sounds” debuted at the 2C Hall, CAFA Art Museum. It is an exhibition around the theme of “sound”, curated by the young curator Chao Jiaxing who presents the works by the 4 young artists Chen Xi, Kyle Skor, Chang Yucheng and Tong Yixin.

In contemporary art, it seems that visual art mainly focuses on “watching” which then occupies a dominant position, while the “listening” which is one of the five senses, has been more or less tried by artists and they apply it in the context of visual thinking, these sound elements continue to stimulate the multidimensional composition of the works of art, imperceptibly rewriting the overall appearance of contemporary art.

The curator Chao Jiaxing said that, “We should re-explore the possibility of post-sound art and the ultimate ruin of the Japanese noise at the end of the century”. Post-sound art is more than a simplified perceptual possibility, and it is not confined to its own form, it should become the universal media that weaves the body of the world into a sense of ontology.

“Hear the voice before seeing the image” roughly summarizes the most straightforward experience when one enters the exhibition hall. A Voice-Over of the Dirt by the young artists Chen Xi and Kyle Skor is placed in the entrance to the exhibition, and the audience is soon included in the atmosphere of “all sounds”. The work was inspired by a famous American black film entitled “M is the Murderer”. In this work, haze is converted to “m”. The secular struggle of the true individual which is narrated by the true language can be said to run through the film from the beginning to the end, but the secular pursuit of the actor and the celebration of life has nothing to do with “m” which permeates the whole film, and the “unrelated" achieve special features from the narrative framework.

In the space of the exhibition hall, on the opposite side of the video installation there is a row of mirrors, the curator deliberately explains it, “the audience can see the self-shadow reflected in the mirror,” and it also uses a number of mobile chairs, “these chairs are not fixed, I would like to express the concept of flow through these chairs.”

In the corner of the exhibition hall is the first work by Chang Yuchen – the installation constituted by the circuit combination, made from a speaker, batteries, long nails (from the copperplate needle) and copperplate. When the copperplate needle contacts the copperplate, the circuit is switched on, and the speaker vibrates and makes a sound. Because the copperplate is not completely purified and even, the sound changes along with the movement of the copperplate needle, just like playing a record.

Tong Yixin’s two pieces of work are placed in the exhibition hall, and “A Single Statement” presents the process of the speech as an ancient and original way of communication that is used to verbalize the text, taking the self-denial as an experiment, using the notebook. Another piece is called “Cello”, composed of three parts – a film, a cello bridge, and two finely polished boards. In the video a female cellist is playing the cello while turning her back on the audience, and the cello bridge, which is separately displayed, bears a transference of the vibration of the strings to the body of the cello in order to amplify the function of sound. But it is interesting that the entire installation is silent.

Chang Yuchen’s second work was entitled “The History of All Hitherto Existing Society”, the artist chooses the chimney which is a monument-like as a symbol of a rich social connotation as the protagonist of the open and monotonous screen, reading “Communist Manifesto” through a graduating system, starting from English to Chinese, as the background sound, the vivid ups and downs of the exquisite voice and the monotonous and boring vision of the screen forms a contrast, obviously conveying the thoughts on society of the artist.

The exhibition continues to October 30.

Text by Zhang Yizhi, Photo by Hu Sichen/CAFA ART INFO

Translated by Chen Peihua and edited by Sue/CAFA ART INFO

About the curator

Chao Jiaxing is a curator and she graduated from the School of Arts, Shanghai University, with a degree in Master of Arts. Her curatorial studies tend to involve practice and the main directions are the cross-border discussions on the participatory art creation, cross-field experiment, philosophical theory and artistic practice, etc.

About the artists

Jiang Yuhui graduated from the Ecole Normale Superieure, with a master’s degree, and then graduated from Fudan University, with a degree as a Doctor of Philosophy and currently teaches in the Department of Philosophy, East China Normal University. The research direction is in contemporary French philosophy and the philosophy of art.

Born in Shanxi, China in 1989, Chang Yuchen graduated from CAFA, majored in photography, graduated from the Graduate School at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2013, majored in printmaking, currently working and living in New York.

Tong Yixin was born in Lushan in 1988, graduated from New York University, with a master’s degree in the Studio Art, now lives and works in New York. Through multimedia installations, the specific work of a field, internet projects, the music and books, Tong Yixin constructs the poetic and absurd narratives to explore the Romantic dialectics in our time, which advocate rationality and capital gain.

Chen Xi & Kyle Skor

Chen Xi was born in Wuhan, China in 1985, graduated from the Department of Fine Arts at Jiangnan University in 2008, and graduated from the Department of Fine Arts at the East China Normal University in 2012, with a master’s degree. He currently lives and works in Beijing. Since 2013, Chen Xi’s works have started to include paintings in a variety of materials, videos, animation, photography and some on-site projects.

Kyle Skor is an American artist born in Saint Paul (1983). In addition to the exhibitions held in the United States, Kyle’s work has also recently been exhibited in Korea, Australia, Malaysia and China.