展覽預告｜陳界仁《她與她的兒女們—引言與序章》

Lin & Lin Gallery is presenting Her and Her Children—Introduction and Prologue, a solo exhibition by Chen Chieh-Jen, from September 16 to November 25, 2023. The exhibition will include the artist’s most recent video works In a World Losing Multiple Worlds I (2022) and Worn Away (2022 – 2023), as well as still photography and sketches, from the series Her and Her Children.

《風摧肉身》概念草圖
Conceptual sketch for Worn Away

《她與她的兒女們》中的「她」，既指曾帶給陳界仁深遠影響的母親，也指不同文化起源中都有的母親女神，以及許下「……如是罪報等人盡成佛竟，我然後方成正覺」悲願的光目女──即地藏菩薩諸多前世中的其中之一。

跨國金融資本集團、軍工復合體、數位與生物科技巨頭等公司王國所共構的帝國，通過掌控全球互聯網系統建構的全域式操控技術，左右著全球絕大多數人的感知路徑、感覺構造、欲望方向與思維模式；同時掌控公司王國的前八十一名富豪所佔有之財富，業已超過全球一半人口所擁有的財產總和。

The “Her” in the tiles refers to Chen’s mother, who deeply influenced him, as well as mother goddess figures from different cultural traditions, such as Prabhacaksuh—one of the many past lives of Bodhisattva Ksitigarbha—who vowed, “Not until all of them have become Buddhas themselves, will I finally realize the Supreme Wisdom.”

The perceptions, desires, and thoughts of the vast majority of the world’s population are now dominated by the Internet, a pervasive control technology run by a corporatocratic empire composed of multinational financial capital groups, the military industrial complex, digital and biotech giants, and others. At the same time, the wealth of the 81 richest leaders of the corporatocracy has exceeded that of half the world’s population combined.

陳界仁 Chen Chieh-jen，《風摧肉身》 Worn Away

維也納分離宮展場照 Installation view, Secession, 2023
攝影師 Photo: Oliver Ottenschläger

在這個新殖民主義／新種姓制度成為現實之際，陳界仁延續他自《十二因緣──思考筆記》（1999-2000／重新編輯2018）以來，對於被加速離心器拋離的諸眾，在看似透明實則管控更加嚴密的時代裏，如何重建自身主體與重塑社會的可能性所展開的感性思考──通過《她與她的兒女們》創作計畫，從不同面向對相關主題進行討論，計畫中的每件錄像作品既可完全獨立觀看，也可連結成前後相互呼應的敘事與討論。

In light of the neocolonial caste system produced by this reality, Chen has been developing his project Her and Her Children since he started working on the video Notes on the Twelve Karmas at the turn of the last century. Throughout the project, he sets forth perceptual thinking that entertains the possibility of rebuilding subjectivity and society for the multitudes that have been discarded by ever accelerating mechanisms of seemingly transparent yet more stringent control. Discussing these themes from different perspectives in each video, Chen makes them either viewable as independent works, or as part of a larger narrative.

《在沒有世界的世界中I》的命名，意指當前的世界已沒有任何可逃逸的外部，影片中於黑夜荒原上的孤獨靜立者，在被從自然雨水到如資訊流般的非自然雨水不斷包覆與穿透下，既如當代個體的處境，也彷彿以平靜之姿與不斷變化的無盡資訊流進行某種對質。《風摧肉身》則以人類社會進入新黑暗時代為敘事起點──一位失業且無法申辦信貸者，在只能申辦由帝國規劃的「協助優化生物功能貸款專案」後抵達「候轉區」，於等待成為生物實驗耗材的過程中，逐漸體悟到看似「無用」的其他被拋棄者，在沒有任何出路的環境中，如何開啓重建主體的另一種認識論。

The title In a World Losing Multiple Worlds I suggests that there is no escape from the world in which we are forced to live. In the video, a solitary person stands in a nighttime wilderness, and is soaked by a driving rain suggesting a deluge of information. Chen portrays this plight of contemporary individuals as a juxtaposition between a calm demeanor and a continually shifting onslaught of information. In Worn Away, Chen takes humanity’s entrance into a new Dark Age as the starting point of his narrative. An unemployed individual who cannot apply for credit arrives at the Transit Area after he has no choice but to apply for the empire’s Optimization of Biological Function Assistance Program. While waiting to become some disposable subject of a human experiment, he gradually learns from other apparently useless and discarded people that it is still possible to rebuild his subjectivity even though he is faced with a seemingly impossible situation.

風摧肉身 – 闔上雙眼 Worn Away — Closing the Eyes

黑白照片．典藏級相紙 b/w photo,archival quality photo paper

2022-2023, 85x150 cm

Chen Chieh-jen, born in 1960 in Taoyuan, Taiwan, graduated from a vocational high school for the arts. He currently lives and works in Taipei, Taiwan. He has held solo exhibitions at the Vienna Secession; Art Sonje Center in Seoul; the Mudam Luxembourg; the Taipei Fine Arts Museum; Redcat art center in Los Angeles; the Museo Nacional Centro De Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid; the Asia Society in New York; and the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris. Group exhibitions include: the Venice Biennial, São Paulo Biennial, Lyon Biennial, Liverpool Biennial, Gothenburg Biennial, Istanbul Biennial, Moscow Biennial, New Orleans Biennial, Sydney Biennial, Taipei Biennial, Gwangju Biennial, Shanghai Biennial, Shenzhen Sculpture Biennial, Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Guangzhou Triennial, Fukuoka Triennial, and the Asia Pacific Triennial. Chen has also participated in photography festivals in Arles, Spain and Lisbon; film programs of various international art institutes include: Tate Modern, Mori Art Museum, Centre Pompidou and dOCUMENTA 13. He was also the recipient of the Award of Art China—Artist of the Year in 2018, the Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation's National Award for Arts in 2009, and the Korean Gwangju Biennial Special Award in 2000.