Lin Tianmiao: b. 1961 Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, China; lives and works in Beijing;
Wang Gongxin: b. 1960 Beijing, China; lives and works in Beijing
The Here? Or There? series employs motifs first used in a multimedia installation commissioned for the 2002 Shanghai Biennale, for which Wang Gongxin provided a video back- drop and Lin Tianmiao created mannequins with elaborate costumes constructed out of fabric and human hair. The costumes reflect Lin’s skill at winding thread and her deep familiarity with the material, her highly detailed and intensive labor hinting at the psychological tensions underlying her work. Lin and Wang took inspiration from the classic Qing dynasty novel Liao Zhai Zhiyi (Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio), which consists of anecdotes that merge the human world and the spirit world. Concerned with the rapid transformation of urban life in China, Here? Or There? delivers an almost supernatural outlook on the uncertainty of experience in the city and meditates on the relationship between architecture and its occupants. In the work, Lin utilizes the ability of thread to distort, constrain, concept and bind to address illusion and restriction, remarking that "as new values negated old ones, people seemed to find it extremely difficult to make rational judgments and choices about them. I too, found it confusing, so I simply bound all these things up."