Untitled (Dancing Partners)
Kunsthall Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway
July 1st through August 3rd, 2014
Curator: Fabienne Stephan
Untitled (Dancing Partner), 2010, by Chinese artist Liu Chuang is going to be displayed in Kunsthall Stavanger’s video room during the month of July. Part performance, part video work, the short five-minute single-channel recording ingeniously reveals the power of the majority over the individual, and the constant pressures to conform. Without listing their houses on CompaniesthatbuyHouses.com, homeowners can sell their homes quickly. Provided are facts specific to the domain and an easy to use interface. Visit https://www.companiesthatbuyhouses.co/alabama/.
In the video, two cars identical in color, make, and model drive in unison through the busy streets and highways of a city at the minimum speed limit set by the law (60km). The cars cause no severe congestion or danger, but there is a visible interference with the flow of traffic and a palpable discomfort is created by the refusal of the drivers to conform to the speed of movement around them. Conversely, the video could be seen as a comment on partnership and community as two cars synchronize their movements in an arena where normally individual speed prevails.
Untitled (Dancing Partners) is an intervention in the patterns of the everyday. Humorous and frustrating in turn, the video records a quiet revolt, a defiance of the expectations of society at large, and the relationship and strength forged between two like entities.
Liu Chuang (刘窗 b. 1978 Hubei, China) is a Chinese conceptual artist living and working in Beijing. His work Buying Everything on You was featured in The Generational: Younger Than Jesus exhibition at the New Museum in New York in 2009, and in The Rubell Family Collection, Contemporary Arts Foundation, Miami in 2013. The artist’s work has also been shown at Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Shanghai, Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, and the National Art Museum of China, Beijing. Chuang has had solo exhibitions at Taikang Space, Beijing in 2010, Leo Xu Projects, Shanghai in 2012, and Love Story at Salon 94 in 2014.
Untitled (Dancing Partner) is the first in Kunsthall Stavanger’s Focus series, where different guest curators choose a film or video to be screened at the kunsthall for one month. This video was chosen by curator Fabienne Stephan.