Portfolio
Yuqiang is a visual practitioner whose work navigates the intersections of biology, posthuman study, and queer study.
His practice delves into how emerging technologies/societal innovations reshape our understanding of the life and human identity. His work challenges conventional narratives by questioning how scientific narratives, cultural practices, and technological imagery collectively mediate our perceptions and cognition.
By integrating concepts from diverse disciplines, Yuqiang seeks to bridge the gap between technology and humanity, fostering connections between his practice and the wider community. He envisions a form of coexistence within multiple ecological systems, exploring the complexities of being and emotion, and striving to construct a more diverse and inclusive future.
Imaging
the Unrested Future
2024
Performance
0:30’25”
Emerging medical imaging technologies have transformed the body into images and concepts from different perspectives. The body is no longer understood as a physical entity but as a state of constant becoming, continuously evolving alongside technology revolutions within scientific culture. In this context, the imaging body functions as a way for us to understand and perceive ourselves, existing as a perspective that can be evaluated and modified within intergenerational relationships and doctor-patient dynamics. This performance unfolds through a dialogue between my mother and me in the hospital about ageing, time, and identity. It examines how we think about the body and identity, as well as how we confront death, illness, and envision the future.
Performance Archive from London Design week and Jwllrs
Solid Liquid
2023
Installation/Performance
200*200*300cm /0:10’30”
When the physical and emotional boundaries are strained by the confines of space, it results in a weakened connection to the external world, often leading to a state of stagnation. Drawing inspiration from personal experiences, this project explores the phenomenology of immigration.
When the environment changes, migrants who are “othered” cannot maintain their identities, lifestyles, and culture. Thus, they continually seek solutions to interact and integrate with their new environment. By adopting the perspective of a scavenger, within a fictional portrayal of the existence of time and space in human history, the story navigates the complexities of transformation. This transformation challenges notions of existence and embraces the fluidity of human experience. Through a blending of memories and narratives, it unearths the repercussions of change while celebrating the liberation found in the dynamic nature of our being.
http://content-free.net/articles/solid-liqui
0:01’43”
Installation Archive
Mixed Media
200*200*300cm
Operating Room
Stop-Motion Animation/Performance
0:01’45”
Operating Room examines the hospital as a contemporary space where science intersects with the body, embodying power structures that shape our understanding of existence. In the context of East Asia, where queer bodies navigate cultural landscapes distinct from Western equality narratives, this film offers a reflective exploration.
Through poetic and biological language, Operating Room constructs a nonlinear narrative that reimagines the conceptualisation of bodies within the merging contexts of contemporary and traditional Chinese medicine. It employs a non-resistance resistance, talks about the struggles we face while weaving love and inclusivity as connective forces. The film considers the body as both a vessel of desire and a locus of transformation, where personal and collective identities are continuously reshaped. It contracts scientific precision with metaphysical longing, offering a vision of bodies not as fixed entities but as evolving sites of memory, desire, and shared experience.
Genes contain the entire world we know.
Since the explosive beginning of the universe, driven by a mysterious energy,
molecules have begun to combine in this way.
The human body is everything that humans know about beauty,
peeking from the eyes of God.
In the mysterious shape of the sex glands,
body fluids are intertwined and sticky with all desires.
We are shaping these desires while being shaped by them.
The body fluid carries a certain signal,
flowing through the mountains and rivers,
surging through every rock underground,
and continuously nourishing every piece of land.
People always ask about this source;
it is them,
countless inhabitants living on the myelin sheath,
doing a lot of calculations at all times on 100 billion lonely planets.
They want to send a signal,
trying to connect as one,
because they are also curious about the meaning of their existence.
The power of this connection is so strong that they created a self-destructive tendency;
the rock paintings are hidden in caves,
the strange circles in the wheat fields,
and the huge rocks on Easter Island looking into the distance,
They all speak of this desire.
All languages revolve around this impulse so that they have to observe through the eyes of others.
Heterosexuals,
prostitutes,
Buddhists,
or any existential identities cannot define who they are，
because they don't know whether they can feel a certain kind of real existence,
looking to the sky, not as truth seekers.
How To
Plant An Avocado
In
Your Home
2023
Performance/ Installation
0:08’50”
This performance focuses on monologues and uses the sounds of living objects. By establishing avocados growing in glass jars and describing fragile and shifting ecosystems for urban living and immigration, it explores the state of millennial life, the hostage of consumerism, and the need for spiritual lives for modern people.
https://wip2023.rca.ac.uk/events/visual-communication-how-to-plant-an-avocado-in-your-homehttps://linktr.ee/manifold_space
Once I saw the avocado seeds set gift box in a Boutique, and there were samples that had grown up next to it. The huge seeds of the avocado caught my attention. But one sold for 50 pounds. So I decided to buy avocados from grocery shops and plant them by myself.
I have never observed the birth of life at such a quiet distance. It only takes a month for it to grow from a dormant and inactive state to a life connected to the outside world. However, I am already worried about their future. When I finish my graduate life next year, they might lose the room to grow.
Without water, they are vulnerable.
I have 7 sprouting plants and one of them has grown very tall, no different from the avocado gift set I saw in the store, or even better. 2 are still germinating in the bathroom, one is in the refrigerator, and the other two have stopped growing. Due to negligent care, they were accidentally exposed to dry air by me during the initial germination stage and then rooted. The tip gradually begins to blacken and stops developing normally. At first, I thought they would be able to come back to life like many plants, but as long as I put them back in the water, the results were not satisfactory.
Installation, Mixed Media, 100*100*150cm
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2022
Performance
0:19’24”
Encoded Fragments is a series of work that is finished or in progress, which uses the recollection of dreams as a tool to build a bridge of communication with the deeper self. The research uses sounds, performance, and diary-sourced poems as the vehicles of investigation.
Personal experiences shape the uniqueness of the individual, not only in terms of historically defining moments; but also in terms of long psychological constructions. A pattern of categorizing and organizing these memories is stored in the Electronic components, and changes in the inner structure are accomplished through the recurrence of memories on identical occasions, in order to help make sense of one's existence.
Dreams, as part of reality, frequently appear as nodes connecting the future to the past, appearing and disappearing so blurred that I sometimes can't tell if they existed, but when I capture them over time, curating them in a narrative deconstruction, they gradually constitute a larger pattern. The text attempts to find a balance and blend between perceptual cognition and scientific development by recording, organizing, and analyzing memories, and dreams; and also combining, and appropriating biology as well as other science subjects to approach the topic.
In these texts, some key archives - memories of my mother, identity, and dreams are repeatedly regurgitated. As a result, I create the opportunity to see my thoughts and actions from a distance, as a more objective spectator.
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Performance Archive
Script for the Monologe
A man drove to the jungle with his mother and wife to escape his life.
He spent a long time convincing them about the life they could create in the forest, in harmony, and in peace.
After a while, the man decided that life was too hard and drove away,
alone in the evening.
The mother went crazy, laughing every day and saying: I'm down! I'm down! I'm down!
The wife killed her mother-in-law first
and then started looking for the man.
Months later, she trudged to finally crawl out of the jungle, her hands rough, her hair disheveled, and her body stinking of filth.
She found the man, who by now was with another woman.
She stabbed the woman in the chest with a knife. Meanwhile, the man jumped in his car and drove into a pile of rubble, the last tire marks of the car disappearing in the jung
Encoded Fragment
2022
Performance
0:19’24”
Encoded Fragments is a series of work that is finished or in progress, which uses the recollection of dreams as a tool to build a bridge of communication with the deeper self. The research uses sounds, performance, and diary-sourced poems as the vehicles of investigation.
Personal experiences shape the uniqueness of the individual, not only in terms of historically defining moments; but also in terms of long psychological constructions. A pattern of categorizing and organizing these memories is stored in the Electronic components, and changes in the inner structure are accomplished through the recurrence of memories on identical occasions, in order to help make sense of one's existence.
Dreams, as part of reality, frequently appear as nodes connecting the future to the past, appearing and disappearing so blurred that I sometimes can't tell if they existed, but when I capture them over time, curating them in a narrative deconstruction, they gradually constitute a larger pattern. The text attempts to find a balance and blend between perceptual cognition and scientific development by recording, organizing, and analyzing memories, and dreams; and also combining, and appropriating biology as well as other science subjects to approach the topic.
In these texts, some key archives - memories of my mother, identity, and dreams are repeatedly regurgitated. As a result, I create the opportunity to see my thoughts and actions from a distance, as a more objective spectator.
Script for the Monologe
A man drove to the jungle with his mother and wife to escape his life.
He spent a long time convincing them about the life they could create in the forest, in harmony, and in peace.
After a while, the man decided that life was too hard and drove away,
alone in the evening.
The mother went crazy, laughing every day and saying: I'm down! I'm down! I'm down!
The wife killed her mother-in-law first
and then started looking for the man.
Months later, she trudged to finally crawl out of the jungle, her hands rough, her hair disheveled, and her body stinking of filth.
She found the man, who by now was with another woman.
She stabbed the woman in the chest with a knife. Meanwhile, the man jumped in his car and drove into a pile of rubble, the last tire marks of the car disappearing in the jung
Laborotary
2019
Installation
Mixed Media
200*50*200 cm
During my undergraduate studies, my research delved into the realm of immune diseases and viral infections affecting turbot, aiming to enhance the survival rates of aquaculture through innovative vaccines. The extensive use of zebrafish larvae as experimental subjects prompted a profound reflection on the intersection of science, industry, and human desires.
This project unravels the complex relationship between humanity and the rights of animals in the name of experimentation. it unveils a narrative that spans from pivotal scientific advancements to ethically questionable experiments driven solely by the needs of humankind. It is an exploration of the delicate balance between progress and morality, where each experiment appears as a domino piece, teetering on the edge of ethical dilemmas.
Through various mediums, I construct an imagined laboratory, transforming scientific inquiry into an artistic language that questions not only our scientific pursuits but also the profound meaning of human existence.
Feed Me
Performance
0:24’23”
In this work, Shannan and I replicate the process of self-analysis by the objectification of personas. We utilized massive costumes to portray ourselves while simultaneously engaging with the social dynamics of each other.
We create an analysis of life trivialities; as with many conversations between friends, we critique the traits of our personalities and the implications of self-judgment. We investigate further questions through this mutually pulling interaction, how do we absorb and process information? How can we communicate with one another? How do we live in a non-chasing state? How do we look within ourselves? How may we live more coherently and exist more fully?