Pseudo-well A Dilemmatic Aura of Modernity in the west and the non-west Junwei Zhang 1 Master of Fine Arts Contents Thesis Report Living and breathing ...................1 2020 Thesis report .................................2 University of Oregon List of images ..............................18 Committee Members: Colin Ives(Chair) Reference .....................................19 Ying Tan Jack Ryan “I like living, breathing better than working…” — Marcel Duchamp1 1 At the beginning of 2020, an outbreak of disease started in Wuhan, China. “Iron Cage”5. Gradually, we are civilized, educated, and must know how to It’s caused by a novel coronavirus, COVID-19. The symptoms of the illness play this game. If we don’t, we will be abandoned or marginalized by this aren’t very special: dry cough, fever, but very soon they can cause viral society. pneumonia and death. This coronavirus is firstly known from wild animals in a seafood market, later it’s transmitted from one person to another. On What happened to lead us here? From the scale of an individual or of a March 11th, The World Health Organization declared the coronavirus country, human way of living has been chasing after modernization both outbreak a pandemic. At this moment, there is no treatment at all. Globally, hardware — social infrastructure modernization — and software — cultural there are more than two million cases around the world2. On the other modernization. Yet, this race has left many individuals behind, creating a side, Australia is experiencing the unstoppable wildfire, it seems like the deep social gap impossible to be narrowed within decades to come.  On entire country is about to be burned down. Although this pandemic chaos the one hand, this modernization brings us the growth of scientific seems to be a big scale incident, just like Australian unstoppable wildfire, consciousness, the advance on technologies and more efficient society and for me, they are all political crises laid out in a sheet of newspaper — “On so on. On the other hand, modernization carries the mundanity of everyday the left, they have put knowledge of things; on the right, power and human life, pursuit of profit and pragmatic mentality. The term modern seemly politics.”3 Only during crisis, disaster, war time, humans become equal, becomes an role-switch from the world of old to the new. During the Age sort of. I prefer to say Humans become equally raw. of Enlightenment, philosophers at that time believed that mankind would progress steadily towards into social, economic and political being as long as To think of “rawness” and “political crisis” is to admit the paradox of the reasoning was addressed properly6. This became the universal value to modernity, the modernity in the west and the one in the non-west (or ‘the emancipate human. ‘Rationality’, ‘consciousness’, ‘scientific knowledge’ are rest’ 4 I shall call with a bit western hubris). This paradox is amplified by frequently used terms. And I believe that during the outbreak of Covid-19, the effect of globalization. In this globalized world, people believe in robust the handling of this crisis undercuts all the terms I mentioned above. man-made systems: institutional education, medical system, criminal justice system, transportation system and others which humans have built, While the world asks for collaboration to improve life quality in all countries, improved and relied on throughout our time. It’s not surprising, because why are there still poor countries whose people seem to suffer from a lack no matter if we are born in an advanced country or the Third world, of basic needs/equality for survival such as food security or medical gear everyone is automatically given the use of these systems, we are routinized supply? In fact, this is one of many side effects of the modernity in the non- and standardized. Once we get inside of this system, we start the circle: west. Taking a step back to the history of discovery or of modernization, we “Learn, pay, use, earn”. This system and belief are similar to Max Weber’s can observe a bigger picture of effects or consequences of our own decisions 2 and actions which were thought to be revolutionary7 and legitimate. The between high-tech and working-class. Computerized knowledge has following era of Enlightenment became the Age of Invasion, Colonization become the force of production over the last few decades. “Nation state will and Exploitation. It’s not the end until the late 20th century when many one day fight for control of info (including the computerized knowledge), colonized nations gained their independence, but the entire world became just as they battled for control over territories in the past .”11 In other words, sociopolitically messier due to the degradation of traditional virtue and the modernity in the non-west became a big on-going experiment mixture ethic. In other words, the current global situation comprises a lack of of anti-modernity, modernity and post-modernity. responsibility and willingness to pay back/compensate from the West. Instead, Here is the typical dilemma among many developing countries: During my artist-in-residence in Salem in Summer 2019, my works touched 1) if they choose to go back to feudal, they will be colonized again by the sense of globalization by simplifying the individual and globalization developed countries, such as Japan in the early 19th century; 2) if they relationship into three elements: space, destination and ourselves. Three choose to modernize, their original culture will be challenged and gradually projects From West to East, A Well and Root were made to correspond to lost, such as China; 3) if they lack the condition to modernize, they have those three elements. I use tires as a means to reflect the most essential no solution at all, such as Afganistan. These can be reflected through the need to be modern which drives our revolutions — moving. I realized that global anti-modernity trend8. This dilemma explains why the birthplaces need is not food, not sex, not humanity, it’s about conquering, discovering, of ancient human civilization, like Egypt, Greece and Iraq are even out of connecting. In my project From West to East, I used the tire treads that I the contemporary table. China, the remaining one, becomes the second found on the highway as material to interweave American land. At this land, largest GDP9 by playing the role as world factory benefiting but exploited everyone is involved of driving, when you drive, you conquer. However, by modernization itself. Like China, many other developing countries are the tire treads always sit on the highway and will not be cleared out. This doing similar things by exporting single raw product, e.g. human labor, is very interesting phenomenon for me to connect my rumination — why crude oil, banana, etc. this world is so capable of producing but it lacks the capability of fixing or recycling? Currently, this pandemic stops our moving, everyone is stuck In addition, the accelerated modern mode of production is reinforced at home. As an artist, I imagine there is a ‘reset’ button which Covid-19 by the digitalized and computerized knowledge. In one sense, it brings presses down reluctantly on us. opportunity in the non-west to catch the train under globalization to setup factories transferred from the west. A great example is the documentary After all, the aforementioned dilemmatic aura of modernity throughout the film American Factory10 in 2019, which examined the situation of Chinese west and the non-west becomes the background of my work Pseudo-well. invested factory in the post-industrial Ohio and displayed the clash It has two emphases: one is local community; another emphasis is that the 3 presence of self is replaced by the absence of the self. That is, we have to sense of aesthetic immersion. self-isolate to protect our lives and the lives of others. This self-isolation, social distancing period can be considered as de-industrialization and de- Pseudo-well is an installation consisting of junk tires. It looks like an modernization. Depending on the degree of enforcement from different abandoned playground under this pandemic. By standing on the platform, governments, most corporations are banned. International travel is banned. viewers can have the access to look inside the round well, at the same time Non-essential access to physical places is banned. This self-isolation is they will be overwhelmed by the smell of junk tires. A Kinect interactive seemly sending us back to time before the Age of Enlightenment in which camera captures the body shape of the viewer and projects on what they access to other physical areas was limited and time-consuming, and people see at the bottom of the well — the moving sky, the sky may come from are stuck in their local communities. the window view of a space station. When we look up, we look at the sky even if you are standing in a well, but when we look down, we look into a The local community in my project is built up not only with the material well, our world seems to be separated by a narrow window. With available but also through the process. Each individual is like the junk tire which and limited access we have under this pandemic, we somehow become has conquered more than 50000 miles, but they end up in the junkyard, frogs living in the well. Like many stranded airplanes, cars, even low price we are stuck at home. These junk tires are sponsored by a local tire shop, oil, these tires become junk. Thus, our presence of self is replaced by the the experience is quite interesting to me. When I approached the manager absence of the self. of the tire shop, he had no interest in my project, because it doesn’t have any commercial benefit to him, if I tell him my concept, it probably would be even worse. At that time, I realized the challenge of bridging art people and non-art people. If I have to make this project, I must change the way I communicate with him. After my request, he gave a tour of his shop, he explained to me how the whole system works including selling, recycling and junking. What shocked me was that these junk tires are actually bought by Chinese recycling companies. My project Pseudo-well is an extension of my previous work A Well, back then I only had a vague plan to address the disconnectedness of individual and our globalized space by using the round shape of a tire and the depth of it to mimic the limited tiny world as a well, but it wasn’t everything I hope for, and it lacked the interaction and 4 5 .... 6 The Pseudo-well project shares some affinities with the work of other this world. Ironically, under this pandemic, we human beings are not artists, such as The Swimming Pool of Leandro Erlich. When I encountered behaving like Cai’s work’s assumption. I assume it’s never gonna be like that. Leandro Erlich’s The Swimming Pool in Kanazawa in Japan 2019, I was amazed by how the work pinpointed the ambiguity and illusion existing When I first finished the prototype of Pseudo-well, I assumed an audience in this man-made society. Isn’t our world shaped by the obscureness and interacting with my work, not just sitting in the gallery. At this time the illusion from us? The Swimming Pool allows visitors to look down into project still waits for people to walk around it, climb the stairs and look a seemingly typical pool full of water under which other visitors walk into the well. And the sky no longer needs to be projected at the bottom, it around the pool. A climbing ladder installed from below directs the gaze can be exposed under the real sky and reflected through a mirror or other of the visitors upward or tempts the visitors to climb up. What they can mechanisms. When the installation is paired with the slide, our playground see is the blurry image of the world outside the swimming pool. Since has a wider audience not only children but also ambitious men with endless underwater is recreated using a thin piece of glass with water running conquering desires. If this pandemic lasts a bit longer, I imagine many over top of it, this technique leaves the viewers with only blurry visions months later, these tires are full of mosses and the platform is slippery and when viewers look up or even look down. In other words, the thin piece rotten, the slide will not be played by neither a child nor an adult. The whole of glass with water running over on top can be interpreted as a mirror project will be abandoned and forgotten, no participant to interact with it, of the world or simulacra12 as Jean Baudrillard says. We expect to see no individual to claim the ownership, no environmentalist to criticize it, no things clearly in their original and natural form; however, what we get Chinese company to recycle it. is distorted images no matter which directions we attend to. This work is fun and interactive, its concept is even in line with how I understand I believe that the dilemmatic aura of modernity throughout the west and the the unevenness of conquering and fixing. Besides shared dimensions, non-west could be reflected through my work Pseudo-well's two emphases The Swimming Pool and my work of Pseudo Well have some differences, on local community and the shift from self-presence to self-absence. especially under this pandemic. Another artist’s work is Cai Guo-Qiang’s Heritage at Queensland Art Gallery, Australia. The Heritage poses a ‘what if’ hypothesis: what if today were the end of this world, how would you want to react as a human being? In that work, 99 life-sized replicas of predators and prey are heading down respectfully and silently drinking water from the last clean water pond in 8 ~ /. 9 - - l \ '!' \ - ' ... ' 10 ~---------- 11 12 14 ....- .... ,. 15 From the theory I read in Zen Buddhism13, it mentioned a stage similar to the concept which situates the goal of my work in the current global situation. This stage is surrounded by a spectrum of self-loss and self- found and that of sadness and joy, From the very beginning, pure and immaculate, he has never been affected by defile- ment. He calmly watches the growth and decay of things with form, while himself abid- ing in the immovable serenity of non-assertion. When he does not identify himself with magic-like transformations, what has he to do with artificialities of self-discipline? The water flows blue, the mountain towers green. Sitting alone, he observes things undergo- ing changes. To return to the Origin, to be back at the Source —— already a false step this! Far better it is to stay home, blind and deaf, straightway and without much ado, Sitting within the hut he takes no cognisance of things outside, Behold the water flowing on, whither nobody knows; and those flowers red and fresh—— for whom are they? However, I realized the above theory relating to the stage is unachievable and idealistic in the mist of this pandemic, indeed, that captures the equivalency of the modernity's dilemma of the west and the non-west. 17 From West to East Tire treads, hanging mechanism, projector Dimensions variable 2019 Pseudo-well Junk tires, wood platform, projection mechanism, slide Dimensions variable 2020 List of images: Artist: Leandro Erlich The Swimming Pool Media and technique: concrete, glass, water Size: H280 ×W402×D697cm 2004 Artist: Cai Guo-Qiang Heritage 99 life-sized replicas of animals, water, sand, drip mechanism Dimensions variable 2013 18 1. Pierre, Cabanne. Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp. New York: The Viking Press, 1971. 2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Coronavirus Disease 2020 Situation Summary. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/summary.html 3. Bruno, Latour. We Have Never Been Modern. Harvard University Press, 1993. P3 4. Kishore, Mahbubani. The Great Convergence: Asia, the West, and the logic of one World, 2013. New York PublicAffairs Reference: 5. Max, Weber. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. 1905 6. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason. Hackett Publishing Company, 2002 7. Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy contained in the Collected Works of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels: Volume 6 (International Publishers: New York, 1976) pp. 105–212. 8. Alitto, Guy Salvatore. Chinese Translation of Anti-modernization thought trends in a world- wide perspective: on cultural conservatism. Guizhou Provincial Press 1991. 9. World Bank Data. https://data.worldbank.org. 10. American Factory, Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Distributed by Netflix. 2019. 11. Jean Francois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A report on Knowledge, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1984. 12. Jean, Baudrillard. Simulations, New York: Semiotext(e) 1983. 13. D.T. Suzuki. Essays in Zen Buddhism: First Series. New York: Grove Press, 1927. 19