'Thus it is wrong to look for "frozen events" in images. Rather, they replace events by state of things and translate them into scenes.'

(Flusser, 1983)

They stand still at the edge of time, in plain sight. Their silent composure is contested against the cacophony of history. In alternative worlds that they etch, we carefully approach through an outdoor choreography that weaves fragmented perspectives, that dares you to bow in front of a dichotomy between nature and culture, to be transported into an unknown territory freely, and willingly. 

When ontology is gravitated towards text but mediated through image, perhaps we could think through things, as much as working through things. The latter stands as a temptation; the former is yet a necessity of revival. Lament the looming crisis of rationality - an excess of obsolete actions is met with the scarcity of intermediate space. 

In every shivering moment I return to weeds, a photographic archive that has been nurtured for nearly half a decade, which I perceive as merely a beginning. For a series that has transformed through the pandemic, two slow-motion screens are incorporated as new additions. Together they conjure up a suspension that further probes into the taxonomy of frozen frames and long exposure, single and multiple temporalities. Last is an edited audio from the 1967 Walt Disney’s production, ’The Jungle Book', and a looped excerpt of the film, in which natural weeds were spotted against ancient ruins in forests when our furry companions expressed desire for becoming human. The overlaid formal alterations through looping, zooming, scaling, pacing and expediting is, to me, a rhetoric of contemporary resurrection.

For details: https://www.liqueenie.com/worlds-that-they-etch

Kwan Q Li

A Hong Kong interdisciplinary artist, Kwan Q Li is perhaps most dedicated in crafting hybrid situations coalesced with image and text, performance and installation. Her research-based practice explores post-colonial intricacies and ideological alternatives within neoliberal and anthropocentric contexts. Former exhibitions include performance / lectures at the AI & Society Journal conference at the University of Cambridge (UK) and the IdeasCity residency co-curated by NTU CCA (Singapore) and the New Museum (US). A Hong Kong Design Trust Grant recipient, her latest collaborative project on data urbanism will be featured at the Hong Kong Pavilion, La Biennale Architettura di Venezia 2021. Queenie holds a Bachelor of Fine Art degree from the University of Oxford (UK), where she was awarded the Stuart Morgan Prize for Art History, the school’s most commended thesis prize. She is currently attending the SMACT programme at MIT. 

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http://liqueenie.com

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