FIELD MEETING TAKE 6: THINKING COLLECTIONS

Bingyi (Beijing)

 

Ruins

Pop-up Installation

Synopsis: This installation incorporates an excerpt from the artist’s epic trilogy of films set in the inner-city hutongs, or historic alleyways of Beijing. In 2015, Bingyi began collecting thousands of Hutong Love Letters — personal stories written by ordinary people on their life-changing experiences in the hutongs, shortly before they were demolished from the heart of China’s contemporary capital. Using these testaments as inspiration, Bingyi spent three years re-writing and re-shooting the films which combine conceptual architecture, performance art, documentary, large-scale ink paintings and installation. The full work is organized in three captivating chapters, incorporating tragic comedy, poetic romance, and murder mystery, in addition to the only footage of the 2017 demolition of Beijing’s Daxing neighborhood.
 
Bingyi’s FIELD MEETING participation is supported by INK Studio (Beijing).
 
Watch video of Bingyi’s Pop-up here
Watch all FIELD MEETING Pop-ups here
 

Bio: An artist, writer, curator, cultural critic, and social activist, Bingyi combines her interests in ecology, science, philosophy, history, and aesthetics into a multi-faceted artistic practice that encompasses land and environmental art, site-specific installation, musical and literary composition, ink painting and performance art. She is known for her large-scale ink paintings as shown in her occupation of the Toronto City Hall in October 2013, when she created an 1,800 square meter ink painting over the course of a twelve-hour entitled Metamorphosis.