Reality, Fiction, and Possibility: ICA Opens New Show

This week, NYU Shanghai’s Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) unveiled a new exhibition titled We the singular in multiple ghosts. I the multiple as parts of the whole. Presented by artists Yu Ji, Dong Longyue, and Wang Xiaofu, the exhibition explores the space between reality and fiction, storytelling, the body, light, and shadow. 

The exhibition is the third of the ICA’s four-part artistic research series, Another Knowledge is Possible (2021-2024). While Another Knowledge is Possible intends to examine different types of knowledge that are often omitted by traditional narratives, this exhibition presents art as an exploration of ways of knowing. The artists question — and ask the audience to question — what knowledge we are attempting to create when making or viewing art. 

_{A visitor looking at Untitled No. 1, a piece by Yu Ji.}

“While we can't explore all alternative ways of knowing,” said curator Michelle Hyun, “one possibility that felt urgent, and easily overlooked in the broader project [of] recuperating ‘other’ knowledges, is the fundamental premise of seeking meaning, or the interpretation of sensory experiences and signs (images, sounds, etc.) itself.  One can and does know things, through sensory perception, intuition, etc., without it necessarily being "about" something else.”

“The exhibition is not organized by a dominant concept, with no strong point of view to export, and the authorship of our creativity is vague,” explained artist Wang Xiaofu. “For this exhibition, there isn’t a strict way to engage.” 

Like the spectral space that lingers between reality and fiction that the exhibition explores, the mediums used vary wildly, with sketches, texts, sculptures, videos, and performance pieces. The audience, too, is invited to participate in the art, with interactive pieces included in the exhibition. 

_{Video still from 3, by Yu Ji, Dong Longyue, and Wang Xiaofu.}

As they first enter the exhibition, viewers encounter a series of screenprints, layered with collages of charcoal sketches, photos, and texts. Audio from 3, a video and audio piece created by artists Yu Ji, Dong Longyue, and Wang Xiaofu, echoes throughout the exhibition space. 

The video plays out scenes of the three artists in a construction space, with images occasionally superimposed on top of each other. Clanking sounds immerse the viewer in the scenes of this space — and echo as the viewers walk through the rest of the exhibition.  

_{A detail of A Statement of a Table, by Yu Ji, Dong Longyue, and Wang Xiaofu.} 

Several of the pieces invite visitors to interact with the art. An illuminated acrylic box entitled Ɛ allows viewers to select panels of text and place them onto the box, allowing them to read excerpts from a novel written by the three artists. Another piece, a table covered with small pieces of art ‘in progress’ evokes a sense of a shared artist workspace and invites the viewers to flip through the pages of the story the artists wrote.