"Your Friendly Neighborhood" (上海好邻居)
// BLURB //
I wake up already tired, which feels unfair considering I spent half the night clinging to the side of a high-rise like a very determined ornament. Shanghai doesn’t really sleep, it just changes outfits, so by morning it’s humming again. Scooters weaving, aunties doing tai chi, someone arguing with a coffee machine that refuses to cooperate. Most days are a blur of vertical commuting. Up glass towers, across rooftops, over traffic that treats lanes as a suggestion. People assume it’s all heroics, but honestly it’s a lot of logistics. Where to land without startling a rooftop gardener. How to stop a runaway delivery cart without becoming part of the package. Whether this is a “save the city” situation or a “someone lost their cat again” situation. (It’s often the cat.) There’s an intimacy to seeing the city from above. The Bund glowing at dusk, the Huangpu folding through the city like a memory, windows lit with thousands of small lives unfolding at once. I’m everywhere and nowhere, visible for a second, gone the next. By nightfall, I’m sore, hungry, and oddly content. No applause, no headlines. Just the quiet satisfaction of knowing the city made it through another day intact. Tomorrow, I’ll do it again. Same skyline, same responsibility, slightly better footwork.
I wake up already tired, which feels unfair considering I spent half the night clinging to the side of a high-rise like a very determined ornament. Shanghai doesn’t really sleep, it just changes outfits, so by morning it’s humming again. Scooters weaving, aunties doing tai chi, someone arguing with a coffee machine that refuses to cooperate. Most days are a blur of vertical commuting. Up glass towers, across rooftops, over traffic that treats lanes as a suggestion. People assume it’s all heroics, but honestly it’s a lot of logistics. Where to land without startling a rooftop gardener. How to stop a runaway delivery cart without becoming part of the package. Whether this is a “save the city” situation or a “someone lost their cat again” situation. (It’s often the cat.) There’s an intimacy to seeing the city from above. The Bund glowing at dusk, the Huangpu folding through the city like a memory, windows lit with thousands of small lives unfolding at once. I’m everywhere and nowhere, visible for a second, gone the next. By nightfall, I’m sore, hungry, and oddly content. No applause, no headlines. Just the quiet satisfaction of knowing the city made it through another day intact. Tomorrow, I’ll do it again. Same skyline, same responsibility, slightly better footwork.
EDITION, MEDIA, SIZE & WEIGHT
Edition of 8, Shanghai 2025
RGB LED display, Giclée print face-mounted on plexiglass, stainless steel frame
72.5(W)×192.5(H)×5.4(D) cm // 46 kg
CRATE SIZE & WEIGHT
86(W)×201(H)×21(D) cm // 89 kg
EXPOSURE
“The Fourth Wall” at island6 Shanghai
CREDITS
Yang Ziqi 杨子奇 (performance) • Yeung Sin Ching 杨倩菁 (production supervisor) • Helen Chen 陈韵涵 (cinematography) • Thomas Charvériat (art direction) • Tiara Alvarado-Leon (blurb)
Edition of 8, Shanghai 2025
RGB LED display, Giclée print face-mounted on plexiglass, stainless steel frame
72.5(W)×192.5(H)×5.4(D) cm // 46 kg
CRATE SIZE & WEIGHT
86(W)×201(H)×21(D) cm // 89 kg
EXPOSURE
“The Fourth Wall” at island6 Shanghai
CREDITS
Yang Ziqi 杨子奇 (performance) • Yeung Sin Ching 杨倩菁 (production supervisor) • Helen Chen 陈韵涵 (cinematography) • Thomas Charvériat (art direction) • Tiara Alvarado-Leon (blurb)
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