Li Xinmo: This performance piece is closely connected with other installation components Li presents in this exhibition. The process of the performance is also a process of completing the installation on site. An inverted triangle made of green fur is hung on the wall. In front of the triangle, a white baby crib is placed on the ground. I approach the green triangle and use an electric razor in my hand to shave the long green fur. As the fur falls, the shaved part forms the word "humanity."
Holding a glass container filled with green powder in my hand, I sprinkle the green powder around the crib until the ground under the crib is covered with green. Finally, I curl up and crawl into the crib. This work forms an integral part with the installation piece Birth based on the pattern of Fuxi and Nüwa intertwined in snake bodies, as well as the collage work Landscape No. 1 on the wall, presenting an intertextual relationship between artworks.
The inverted fur triangle symbolizes the combination of maternity and nature, while humans are writing human history through a form of violence. The green powder with a natural hue is actually an industrial product, a metal powder containing toxic substances. The baby crib is placed on top of these artificial pigments. My return to the crib covered with green fur also symbolizes a return to the embrace of mother and earth, a rebirth. Through this work, I attempt to explore the state of the Anthropocene and the origin and birth of humans.
Zhong Ting: In this work, the artist places her body in a symbiotic position with other species, so that life is reborn in a spiritual fusion with nature. In his "biophilia hypothesis," Edward Osborne Wilson argues that there is an instinctive bond between humans and nature, a bond which acts upon animals, plants, and landscapes. This instinctive desire to get in touch with nature can guide people to return to their spiritual homeland, heal their wounds, and gain the life force that Mother Nature feeds them with, even as they turn their backs on nature.
