"Scribbles" (乱涂)
// BLURB //
I wonder if you remember learning how to write. Most of us were taught at a young age. I mean of course, it’s an indispensable form of communication and expression. Without it we would be totally screwed, let's be honest. I’m sure since the time you’ve learned it you’ve taken it for granted: the swirling mass of books and notes, love letters and advertisements that have peppered all your days. It’s easy to forget all that practice you had to do. All those rote strokes to turn a line into an idea. But who is deciding what each scribble, scratch and squiggle means? Well, that depends on where you go about your daily life. If it happens to be in the People’s Republic of China, you should know they have the oldest continuously used system of writing in the world. You only need to know about two or three thousand characters to read a Chinese newspaper. The common Chinese person is said to, on average, know about 8,000 characters. The modern Chinese dictionary lists somewhere in the neighborhood of 20,000. However, there are over 50,000 characters that exist. This begs the question: what of all those unused characters? Perhaps they’ve simply outlasted their practical use and are condemned to a quiet destiny of forgotten meanings. Ungraciously back to being just a little scribble.
STATUS
SOLD. Private collection, Berlin.
EDITION, MEDIA, SIZE & WEIGHT
Unique Edition, Shanghai 2015-2019
RGB LED display, sand & resin coating, teakwood frame
102(W)×102(H)×5.5(D) cm // 32.4 kg
TECH SPECS
• 1×SLC SD Card
• 5×ELN-30-5 (INPUT 100~240VAC@0.75A / OUTPUT 5V@5A)
• 1×MWLPV20-5 (INPUT 100~240VAC@0.55A / OUTPUT 5V@3A)
• (10+1 spare)×RGB P5-2525-8S-HL1.0 / D180580​​​​​​​
CRATE SIZE & WEIGHT
115(W)×115(H)×18(D) cm // 60.4 kg
EXPOSURE
Fathers Of My Father” at island6 Shanghai Main Space​​​​​​​
CREDITS
Ryan Nimmo (performance & blurb) • Thomas Charvériat (art direction) • Yeung Sin Ching 杨倩菁 (production supervisor) • Irmantas Bortnikas (documentation)
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