Beijing: Fiction versus Documentation: The Multiple Representations of Reality
Fiction versus Documentation: The Multiple Representations of Reality, with Marie Voignier, Jiang Zhi, and Dong Bingfeng held at UCCA Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing
In the first episode of Video Talks, Marie Voignier (artist & nominee of The Marcel Duchamp Prize 2018), Jiang Zhi (artist), and Dong Bingfeng (curator/critic) discuss the relationship between fiction and documentation in video art, through the perspectives of their own practices.
Video is often used for documentation due to the medium’s ability to capture and present images as objective and accurate. Video art, on the other hand, tends to be a space for experimentation and openness, often incorporating or suggesting fictional elements. Artists today have thus incorporated techniques of documentary making in their art practices. They may depict a situation through an objective lens but simultaneously manipulate representations of reality through camera work and post-production. Through this mix of documentation and fiction, they attempt to reveal what’s below the surface.
Video Talks is a series of programs co-organized with Video Bureau, that aim to foster and stimulate ideas and knowledge production related to video art. As part of an ongoing collaboration, KADIST and Video Bureau host conversations once a year between artists, curators, and critics. Through public lectures and intimate conversations, Video Talks draws from the KADIST collection and Kadist Video Library (KVL), as well as Video Bureau’s artist archive, to raise important questions around the creation, presentation, and consumption of video art today.
Marie Voignier (1974, born in Ris-Orangis, France)
currently lives and works in Paris and Lyon. She is a professor and coordinator master of École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Lyon, France. Driven by a spirit of enquiry and a desire to bear witness, she is interested in complex realities, stories in which several truths intermingle. She was nominated for the 2018 Marcel Duchamp Prize.
Jiang Zhi (1971, born in Hunan, China)
works with a wide range of media, including photography, painting, video, and installation. Fiction and poetry have also been an important part of his artistic output. Consistently engaging with contemporary social and cultural issues, Jiang consciously positions himself at the intersection of poetics and sociology, while weaving mundane social and personal experiences into his works. Jiang was awarded the Academic Award of Reshaping History (Chinart from 2000 to 2009) in 2010, and the Credit Suisse Today Art Award in 2012.
Dong Bingfeng (1974, born in Shanxi, China)
is a curator and producer based in Beijing. He is a research fellow in School of Inter-media Art, China Academy of Art. Dong has worked as curator in Guangdong Museum of Art and Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Deputy Director of Iberia Center for Contemporary Art, Art Director of Li Xianting’s Film Fund, and Academic Director of OCAT Institute. In 2013, Dong was awarded the CCAA Chinese Contemporary Art Critic Award (2013), the Chinese Contemporary Art Critic Award of Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (2015), and the Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Greater China Research Grant (2017).
Video Bureau
is a not-for-profit organization focusing on video art. It is officially launched and open to the public from March 25, 2012. Their work primarily consists of archiving video artworks and its related documents in order to build a comprehensive and searchable database. By organizing Artist Talks and Publications to further the academic impact of our organization, Video Bureau is a foremost platform that provides services to researchers, curators, artists, collectors, students and others working in and out of the art world. Their continuous dedication to this specific artistic medium has become an important tool in the research on Video Art in China.