Washing Water

A4 Museum, Chengdu, China 2024

23 min Duration

The work explores the tension between control and surrender, the intimate struggle of identity, and the constant cycle of destruction and renewal. I begin in a state of vulnerability—bare-chested, soaked in water, crawling through a large purple velvet curtain. The curtain acts as a threshold, a symbolic passage between internal and external worlds.

In my movements, I interact with simple yet transformative objects, like clear bottles of water. Holding them to my eyes as they pour, I distort my vision, inviting the audience to see how perception can shift, flow, and blur. My body becomes both the site of conflict and resolution. Against a wall, my right hand—acting as a force of impulse or subconscious desire—tries to overpower me, while my left hand intervenes in a battle for control.

Breath plays an important role in the work, as a physical and spiritual tool of resistance and transformation. I blow my rebellious hand away, turning it into a pulsating heart, an object of fragility and connection. Through collapse, I seek to reclaim what feels lost.

The appearance of a young girl in a yellow dress brings innocence into this layered narrative—a reminder of renewal or a past self-guiding me forward. My performance ends as it begin, with movement through the curtain, leaving the audience with the echoes of heartbeat rhythms, dripping water, and breath. I aim to create a visceral, poetic experience where the body tells a storie of struggle, resilience, and the void.