Double-Solo Exhibition: PUBLIC INTIMACY 双个展：公共亲密性
17. July 2020
In this particular period of struggle against a global pandemic, Chinese and European governments employed completely opposite policies in terms of epidemic prevention. People in different cultural environments also have opposite attitudes towards treating epidemics and wearing masks, etc. The political, cultural and social difference gave me a great cultural shock. Public Intimacy is a double-solo exhibition created around individual experience in public space.
“Public gatherings” and “Public Intimacy” have become a contested concept during the outbreak. No matter whether it is to maintain “Social Distancing” in Europe or to obey the “curfew” in China, the relationship between individual and distance have become the primary concern.
The exhibition public Intimacy focuses on the ambiguity between the public space and private space. It explores and questions about the tension between the very personal matter of the human body and its relations to public space. It further examines the relations between humans, space and the sense of intimacy. The exhibition presents multiple media works using hologram installations, films, prints, interactive sculptures, and mixed media installations. For more details please visit the exhibition website：
https://www.rca.ac.uk/news-and-events/events/public-intimacy/
Chang Gao
Royal College of Art, London
March 27th, 2020
在这个全球抵抗疫情的特殊时期，不同的文化政治环境对于防疫实行截然相反的推进政策，不同文化环境下的民众对于对待疫情，以及戴口罩问题的相反态度，都对我带来了极大的文化冲击。“公共聚集”与“公共亲密(Public Intimacy)”在任何疫情爆发地都成为一种奢望，无论是欧洲国家的保持“社交距离(Social Distancing)”还是国内的“宵禁”，人与人之间的距离都成为首要关注点。 本次展览“公共亲密性”即以艺术的形式围绕个体在公共空间中的集体经验，在探讨个体、空间、亲密感与权利之间张力的同时，以全息影像装置、影像、版画、ECG心跳互动雕塑和混合媒体装置的多媒体作品，对公共空间和私人空间之间的模糊界限进行再思考。
展览地点：英国皇家艺术学院Dyson Gallery
更多介绍详见展览链接：
https://www.rca.ac.uk/news-and-events/events/public-intimacy/
Organic Access-1
2019, Digital Prints, 150x200cm
People are restrained from behaving freely in public space during the outbreak of epidemic. For example, people were asked to reducing going out and stop organising any large event in public space. Organic Access creates an opportunity for the public to encounter a moment that merges the private and the public. The location I choose for Organic Access is Victoria Station. It is the place where people gather the most. Meanwhile, the city landscape is marked by towering contradictions between the historical architecture and the modern buildings. The slowly squeezed ketchup squeezer symbolises the ejection of human action. When it is projected above Westminster Cathedral, it explores the tension between the very personal matter of the body and its relation to public space during the pandemic.
有机释放1
2019年, 数码印刷, 150x200cm
人们在疫情期间被限制在公共场所自由行事，例如禁止大型集会并减少外出机会等等。有机访问为公众创造了一个与公共空间建立亲密关系的关系。这系列作品选择的位置是伦敦维多利亚车站，车水马龙以及历史建筑与现代建筑之间形成的极大反差，是该地区的标志性城市景观。缓慢挤压的番茄酱与心脏象征着人类行为的 “喷射”与”心跳”, 当作品投射在威斯敏斯特大教堂上方时，作品意在探索疫情期间人体与公共空间之间亲密又疏远的特殊关系。
Organic Access, Emotional Encounter and Mind Peace
2019, Digital Image Shown in Loop in Screen
“Space is in the lives in which we live, and in the organisation of the societies in which we live. (Massay, Jan/2013) This series of public art intervention opens the multiplicity of space, By using the different themes of supernormal stimuli in different types of public space, this series of workare meant to release the mental anxiety during the pandemic.
《有机出口》，《情感相遇》与《心灵平和》
2019年
“空间意味着我们所生活的空间，以及我们所生活的社会组织。”(Massay，2013年1月）这一系列的公共艺术干预开启了空间的多样性。在不同类型的公共空间中使用超个体刺激公共艺术作品，这一系列作品意在疫情期间舒缓大众精神压力。
Emotional Encounter
2019, Hologram Installation, 110x80x100cm
Emotional Encounter is a series of hologram installations projected into the public space. They serve as a tool to change people’s perception toward space and society and reflect the social reactivity during the pandemic. It interacts with the reaction of the audience and allows the public to release desire by encountering a moment of convergence between the private and the public, the day and the night, the real and the virtual.
情感相遇
2019年, 全息影像互动装置, 110x80x100cm
《情感相遇》是一系列投射在公共空间中的全息装置，作品与观众的反应互动，并通过私人空间与和公共空间的融合，白天和黑夜，虚拟与真实之间的融合释放欲望。作品意在改变人们对空间和社会的感受的同时， 反思疫情对于社会层面的影响。
Book of Disquiet-ECG heart rate interactive sculpture
2020, Mixed Media, 60x30x50cm
The work: Book of Disquiet combines the very personal changes of human bodies and art, and the artist’s performance in public space. The sculpture is connected to two sets of Arduino and motors and an ECG heart rate sensor. When the heart rate of the audience increases and decreases, the sculpture raises up and falls slowly. The work serves as the agent to detect people’s perception in public space. The moved sculpture symbolises people’s individual position, which has been neglected by governments and cultural authorities.
不安之书-ECG心率互动雕塑
2020年, 综合材料, 60x30x50cm
作品《不安之书》结合了艺术和人体非常个人的身体变化以及艺术家在公共场所的行为表演。该雕塑连接到两组Arduino、电机以及一个ECG心率传感器，当观众的心率增加或减少时，雕塑就会上下运动并晃动。该作品意在检测人们在公共空间中的感知，运动的雕塑象征着公众被忽视的对公共空间感受的个人立场。
Book of Disquiet – 2
Still Sculpture, 2020 Mixed Media
This work explores the tension between the very personal matters of the body and its relation to public space. It raises questions around the personal and collective experience in public space. It explores the function of public art, and questions how the sensational, mental and emotional reactivity received from the artworks can reflect Chinese urban issues.
不安之书– 2
雕塑作品, 2020年, 综合材料
这件作品探索个人身体与公共空间之间的张力，在提出有关公共空间中个人和集体经关系的同时，探讨公共艺术的功能，如何通过艺术感受所获得的感官，心理和情感反应解决中国城市空间发展问题。
Book of Disquiet-3
2019, Performance Image
When the work is meant to put onto a public space, the physiological change of the audience from the environment will trigger the interaction of the sculpture. The triggered movement of the sculpture may intensify the bodily change of the spectator. The work thus develops a close relationship between art and human bodies within the public space and serves as a method to test people’s perception towards the environment.
As Judith Butler said: When the body speaks politically, it is not only in vocal or written language, the persistence of the body in its exposure calls that legitimacy into question and does so precisely through a specific performative to the body.
不安之书-3
2019年, 行为作品静态影像
当此系列作品放在公共场所时，观众对环境的感受引发生理变化，观众的生理变化触发雕塑的互动。雕塑的变化会加剧观众的身体变化。因此，这件作品在公共空间内建立了艺术与人体及城市空间的紧密联系，并成为检验人们对城市环境感受的一种方法。正如朱迪思·巴特勒（Judith Butler）所说：当身体在讲话时，不仅是通过口头或书面语言，身体的变化也证明了这种合法性，通过对身体的特定表现来精确地做到这一点。
Passion Fruits – Motherhood
2020, Mixed Media, 10x20x30cm
The series of work Passion Fruits expresses the experience of breast-feeding as a mother. When the child holds a mother’s breasts, the breasts are pumped and juicy. However, after the breast-feeding period has finished, the breast is sucked empty and becomes a shrunken balloon. When this series of work is put on the table of the gallery space, it invites the audience to touch the surface of the work and compare audience’s visual expectation and touching experience. The difference between visual expectation and the touching feeling reflects the paradox of social expectation and personal experience as a woman and a mother.
百香果
2020年, 综合材料, 10x20x30厘米
《百香果》系列作品表达了作为母亲母乳喂养的经验。当孩子握着母亲的乳房时，乳房会涨奶，但是，在母乳喂养期结束后，乳房被空吸并变成收缩成泄了气的气球。当这一系列作品放在画廊空间的桌面上时，它会邀请观众触摸作品的表面，并比较观众的视觉期望和触觉的体验，并通过视觉期望和触摸感之间的差异反映了社会期望，以及作为女性和母亲个人经历的悖论。
Standing Above the Cloud
Mixed Media， 2020， 40x20x10cm
This work describes how the figure of the female body is shaped by the expectation of society and how society is in a way re-shaped by human bodies. Meanwhile, it also questions the relationship between the human body and public space, and how these two factors intervene with each other; just like the extended high heal and its relation to the cushion pat.
云端之上
喜鹊羽毛， 石膏和垫子， 2020年， 40x20x10厘米
这件作品描述了女性如何通过社会的期望来塑造的身体形象，以及人类如何以某种方式重新塑造社会。就像持续增高的高跟鞋及其与坐垫互相依附的关系一样，在探讨人体与社会空间之间关系的同时，质疑这两个因素如何相互影响。