“Swing” by Shaojun Wang and Haocheng Li

Performance 01.07.2018 “Swing” by Shaojun Wang and Haocheng Li in Artree Space

I realised that it was a first time I participated a live performance.

The performance was presented during the exhibition “Love, Hatred, Separation”. Only two artists, music and crowd. As performance took place in a kind of chill-out space with swings the artists adapted the performance for this location. Performers were moving slow in white costumes which covered the whole body. Gradually, the participants were cutting this material up until the moment when it bared their bodies.

Emotional tension of the relationship was high because without seeing a person and his appearance we lack the “identification”. So it can be everyone and no one, or this is a beginning, white clearness and emptiness. Gestures of artists were sharp and aggressive and at the same time melancholic and gentle. It was possible to make out a storm of emotions. At the same time, the performance was protracted and the dynamics sometimes disappeared.

The swing associated with childhood and insouciance. Perhaps the artists tried to recreate through the concealment and unfolding the stages of growing up or the stages of the relationship between men. Can this be a problem of gender love? I think very much yes. Today this issue is one of the most urgent in the young and developing society of China. In my mind artists conceived provocation with respect to same-sex love.

In terms of the art performance, I think the idea was shown obvious and straightforward. Although representation in the darkened space with white suits and choreography was keeping the interest of viewers, the subject was shown too narrative.