I received some pictures of the performance and exhibition. I’ll post them here. Below is my artist’s statement on the works in the exhibition:
The Olympic Conspiracy (2009)
Video.
Duration 2:53
The Olympic Conspiracy is monologue that ironically adopts the language of conspiracy theories linking The Olympics to The End of The World. While the intellectual argument proceeds as a series of ‘false causalities’ the emotional undertone is quite genuine, using spurious ideas to express contempt for The Olympics. The three principal influences of novelist Raymond Roussel, philosopher Frederik Nietzsche and new age guru David Icke, come together in ‘The Olympic Conspiracy’ in a non-didactic and self-effacing lecture.
The Customer Is Always Wrong – prelude (2011)
Video: Jia Zhixing.
Duration 2:14
Filmed in Xiamen, this video performance, my first ever work in Chinese, introduces me as the customer: the one who seeks experiences and possessions in exchange for money. While I am critical of this socially constructed role, I here adopt it in order to better express both its inevitability and limitations. This video also introduces the formal language that I go on to develop in the subsequent performance.
The Customer Is Always Wrong (2011)
Video.
This performance document records the main work produced during the CEAC residency. I set out to look at how British identity could be viewed from the perspective of Xiamen. This rather personal document of my time in China, attempts to bring together the many difficulties, pleasures, confusions and insights that I have experienced without turning them into a coherent lesson or story. Working ‘close to the ground’ I have tried to immerse myself within Xiamen daily life using the materials and language available then filtering these through my very Western style of performance to create a hybrid work.
Customer On The Beach (2011)
Photograph. Photo: Irina Birger.
This residency was made possible with the support of Arts Council England and The British Council.
The Toulou guided tour lived up to and exceeded my expectations of what a Chinese coach tour should be. I think I’ll need an entry in itself to cover it, so I will save that for later. For now just two things to note.
The first is that I uploaded some pictures from my camera and they brought back to me a rather odd experience from last week. I can perhaps introduce it in this way: what does Air France/KLM and Xiamen University TKK College have in common? They both say they will give you money then change their mind and say they won’t. Yes, this was another ‘customer’ experience.
I was offered and agreed to a paid lecture, arranged translators who were also to be paid, then the day before the lecture get a call saying they can’t pay. Rather than cancel, which might have been wiser, I did it anyway as my translators and I had all reserved the time, the lecture had been arranged and I had penciled this in as one my educational activities. I don’t imagine I will ever know why it happened like this, all I can do is try to avoid being placed in a similar situation again. I also don’t know if it was a story of they can’t pay or they simply thought they could get away with not paying. If it is the latter, while it is true that I don’t really need the money the principle is exploitative and one I don’t wish to support. Particularly as the University is obviously wealthy.
After the lecture however, things took a turn for the better. My very competent translators took me on a bike ride around the new campus and rolling through this monumental park studded with oversized academic buildings I was able to forget the somewhat petty affairs of TKK College. The ‘5 star’ library was quite a sight. It seemed to take up so much space yet once inside there were not so many books or work spaces available. I had to compare it with the overcrowded library at Goldsmiths, Uni of London, and wonder if they had any more books in Xiamen Zhanzhou campus library. I seriously doubt they had any more here, even though it was 5 times the size.
The second thing I have been doing is looking at the video of the performance and making some adjustments in preparation for Thursday’s show in Shanghai. Two such practical adjustments are to the microphone and tape I use. I have also been looking into some re-writes but those I will save for after the Shanghai performance.
Last night I hosted an “English Salon” where I introduced a theme from my work, performed a short excerpt then we had a proper game of true and false stories. It was quite fun to be host for the evening, I can now understand the attraction of being TV game show host or, more modestly, pub quiz master.
This weekend I head out to the countryside to see some historical sites, the Toulou constructions. I finally get to be a proper tourist for a day and a half, though it will be as part of Chinese tour group so that should be quite interesting in itself.
It takes everything in me to do it but I have started filling out a new gfa application. It seems rather remote from my experience here and hard to focus upon as it somehow requires a shift of thinking. I am aware of having to shift my thinking and language when completing these forms when I am in the UK but here it seems more remote still. I don’t necessarily have many suggestions for how it should otherwise be, I simply note upon opening one of those Arts Council documents it seems like it comes from a very distant land. Still, I will force myself over the next few days to get into the thick of it as I have deadlines to respect.
I had the last language exchange with Kyky and Elaine last night and I will miss them and the not so Italian restaurant that we meet in. It is actually a cafeteria with a few Italian style pictures on the wall. The music cracks me up if I concentrate upon it too hard so I try to block it out. They either play Italian style classic songs, a sort of light opera, early hits of The Beatles or the cheapest imaginable cover versions of 60’s and 70’s Western pop banged out on a Casio keyboard. Quite often people from other tables come over to listen and comment upon our exchanges, one of the waiters took part a few weeks back too. I’m not so taken by the food and the drinks are very sweet but all the same I will miss this place.
The first press article came out about the performance on Saturday. It was rather positive and the link to it is here:
http://www.common-talk.com/cms/node/12115
I managed to more or less take a day off, the only vaguely taxing activity being a resumption of the language exchanges in the afternoon. Picking up from where I left off was in comparison to working on the performance, quite lightweight and fun. I have in the meantime gained some new vocabulary through working on the performance but these are words fixed within an order and not free to come and go within sentences as they please. I realised when doing this again how I quite missed it and this reaffirmed my feeling that it is something I should continue upon getting back to the UK. Having made it through the most difficult and frustrating period of learning the language it would be a pity to stop now.
