On the way of viewing exhibitions for Martians and Earthlings (Sci-Fi Edition)

An expedition of Martian anthropologists arrived, and there were quite a few people there. Let's just assume they came for the show's title. Let’s also assume that the academic training of Martian anthropologists is not much different from that of anthropologists on Earth. Then, when this group of alien scholars decided to leave their "Mars comfort zone", set off for Earth and came to the New Taipei City Art and Culture Center to see this exhibition, their decision to see the exhibition had at least the following possible meanings:

First, aside from whether they have to abide by the 14-day home quarantine or give special treatment to the "diplomatic bubble", these alien scholars at least uphold the matter of "seeing the exhibition", and after all, they still have to physically go to the physical exhibition venue. Spirit. Although the curator Zhang Junyi claimed that the online exhibition area for "Mars Anthropologists" was the main exhibition venue, they did not stop at their home planet for this reason.

Second, regardless of whether they read in their homework on the way to the spaceship, there was a writer on earth who strongly advocated that people should be "flâneur" (flâneur) in their homework. Every new thing, respect the aura of things. At least this group of alien scholars did not feel that if they read all the digital works of this exhibition, the photos of the exhibition on Facebook, and the audio-visual records of the symposium on their own Mars network, even if the fieldwork was completed . (Doing so should result in dismissal from the Mars Anthropology Department.)

Third, perhaps their decision shows that Martian technology has not yet advanced enough to access Earth from a home at least 55 million kilometers away (or even 399 million kilometers at the farthest point). Internet information; or, they are actually curious about the fact that they are within the range of satellites in the earth circle and apply for the communication equipment here to browse the Internet (although these equipment are very old in their eyes), this is the trip to the alien planet. One of the "Key Nostalgic Experience Projects".

All in all, the arrival of Martian anthropologists shows that no matter how rapidly digital technology is changing, how many alternative exhibition experiences have been developed by relevant media with ingenuity, the event of “organizing an exhibition” ultimately means that on the one hand, it is necessary to provide What is exhibited creates new contexts and sites. On the other hand, through this new site, the drive to leave the original sensory comfort zone and drive to a different place must be created. According to this, the Mars anthropologist delegation poured cold water on the people of the earth after a brief exchange of words:

In fact, there is no need to bring out those digital display technologies that you earthlings consider themselves dazzling. Whether it is AR or 3D scanners, these fancy technologies are not new at all in our eyes. We know that due to the current global crisis of COVID-19, a lot of the ingenuity of the presentations were created in response to the current situation (the special vaccine will come to our spaceship later), but can you show us those that are enough to drive people out of sleep Lazy sofas and computer desks, and willing to go to interesting things in unfamiliar places? Earthlings, have you really thought about it, what attracts us to come all the way here to watch the exhibition? Do you really understand the fundamental reason why exhibitions are exhibitions?

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This question of Martian anthropologists is actually extremely puzzling to many people on Earth (it is really only Martians who would ask such a Martian question). Especially for those people on earth who have long been used to the contemporary video streaming environment, as long as they turn on any mobile device, the world's excellent video and audio works will immediately fly to them; just open any shopping website or food Home delivery App, all kinds of daily necessities will also be delivered quickly. In short, now is an era when the home economy is in vogue, or a slightly more literate way of saying it can easily "call the world to our eyes." The idea that Martian anthropologists insist that "people must go to works of art like pilgrims" is so retro!

But the members of the delegation did their homework. They are well aware that the current visual culture of the planet is undergoing a massive transformation. The spread of COVID-19 even helped fuel the trend, accelerating the trend. Today, many Earthlings live in an environment where they are constantly connected to a vast library of video and audio. YouTube, Twitter, IG, Facebook…, all attracting attention. But as long as there is one video stream with a slightly slower speed, the earthlings will immediately "turn the channel". Because there are too rich audio-visual consumption content to choose from, you don’t have to worry about nothing to watch. This group of alien scholars has noticed that because of being in the company of large and small screens at all times, the people on earth have been deeply affected by an attention economy and the logic of audio and video acceleration. "Acceleration" has not only become political correctness, but has even become a firm value presupposition. (One member of the delegation specializing in physical anthropology, γ, said that his research shows that the brains of people on Earth do tend to be overloaded with information and have a tendency to decline in attention. But he firmly denied from beginning to end that there was kidnapping during the investigation. Any earthling.) But there is one thing that is slowly disappearing in such a visual culture trend, and that is "waiting".

For Martian anthropologists, "exhibition" is actually a matter of brewing various "waiting" and laying out its "process" in detail. Because the exhibition is not only the presentation of works, but also includes a series of changes from cognition to experience in the process of people going to the exhibition site and approaching the works of art. Even all the works in the online exhibition area of "For Martian Anthropologists" can be read on their own translation and decoding interface. However, works like "Low-key Works - Greetings to Blecher", which are full of images and word puzzles, are still interesting to be identified, dismantled, and compared by returning to the physical exhibition from online. (Member of the delegation ω said: Our spacecraft is equipped with a warp engine, and it is only a day's return to visit my nurse in the Andromeda galaxy. But using this flash way to see the exhibition, what is there? What does that mean?)

But today, the real charter of "acceleration politics" that people on earth believe in is a cultural logic of "everything should be given immediately": not only many film and television industries like to emphasize the necessity of simultaneous global release, so as to save the need for different time zones. The gap, many updates of technological infrastructure, also like to equate time compression with values such as "productivity", "convenience", and "progress". Therefore, from the reading of web pages, the packetization of audio and video streaming, to the loading speed of the game screen, all should not be too slow. But what has most intrigued Martian anthropologists is: Why would Earthlings so desperately want to create some kind of illusion of "global simultaneity"? What's wrong with living at a different speed of time? More importantly, it seems that the ultimate purpose of this "acceleration politics" cultural logic is not just to "save more time", but to directly erase "waiting" itself. The question is, when did "waiting" become a negative cultural value?

The person who frowned and raised the above doubts was a member of the delegation, β, who was an expert in the field research team (a.k.a. Mars House). He said: You people on Earth are always impatient with "waiting for the weekly update of the new animation", and every time you just want to catch up on the drama after all the episodes are finished. This logic of not waiting is really incomprehensible. Shouldn’t it be fun to wait and discuss with people over and over again? Therefore, he particularly appreciates the works of participating artist Lai Zhisheng. Because one of the latter's old works "Instant" (2013) used the rotating dynamic icon of "image is loading" commonly found in computers to design a time trap that violated the charter of "acceleration politics". It continues to lure the audience into a weird state of infinitely prolonged "waiting" with a gesture of "things seem to be coming". The audience often has to stare for a long time before realizing that this dizzying time trap itself is the focus of the work. In this exhibition, the new work "Light Wind Comes" (2020) installed in the Chuantang of the New Taipei City Arts and Culture Center is obviously a physical revision of the old work in 2013. Only this time, viewers looking up at the spinning ceiling fan probably won't be fooled by the artist again. But member β of the delegation said: Isn't it just because you looked up that you realized that even in the hot summer, there is still a cool breeze blowing in Chuantang? Now that the whole world has been forced into a state of waiting because of COVID-19, is it really not worth mentioning this afternoon that stopped for a long time? Besides, don't you know that there is an Easter egg buried in this work? "Light Wind Comes Slowly" is actually a positive response to the exhibition "Looking up, there is nothing good in life" (2009), isn't it?

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So far, Martian anthropologists have obtained a preliminary observation. They agreed that the convenient feature of "calling the world to our eyes" endowed by the contemporary audio-visual streaming environment has indeed affected the motivation and willingness of "people to go to the work" to a certain extent, which is worth investigating. Regardless of whether this is the case everywhere, at least in Taiwan, just look at the number of lazy viewers at the bottom of the exhibition activity page, desperately asking artists or curators to broadcast live, you can know this kind of exclusive visual oriented reading. Inertia has its rather narrow side. In this regard, the Martian anthropologist χ, who specializes in the study of European culture, is one of the members of the expedition responsible for the collection of texts. He said that in fact, you earthlings have long criticized this matter. I once read an article by a guy named Boris Groys, this guy is a really high acid genius, he wrote this:

“The taste of the modern consumer favors reproductions, or reproductions of the original. Today’s art consumers like art that they can buy—art delivered to their doorstep. Such consumers don’t want to leave, travel to another place, To feel the original as it is, to be in another context. The way he or she wants is to have the original in front of him—and in fact the original does it as a copy.”(1)

This kind of art consumer who loves "art delivered to your doorstep" is talking about you people on earth (don't look next to you, it's talking about you!) Martian anthropologist χ asked with a sideways glance. Even through the dark black protective mask, the slight contempt in his tone could still be easily felt. He went on to say: In this exhibition, Li Mingxue's phrase "To see is to believe" in "The Hollow in the Distance" is not just a criticism of the ideology of "seeing is believing". He deliberately asked the audience to go to Guo Wentai's "The Truth is Out There" to find this text. In fact, he was joking that people were unwilling or simply forgot to go to the work. In other words, "art delivered to your doorstep" is beautiful and convenient. If you mean those movies or TV series that can be streamed online, it may not be a big problem. But not all works can be copied. Especially those art that "can't be delivered to the door", that is, works that involve touch or smell, and even require multiple senses of the body to operate at the same time, such as Xu Ruiqian's "Is it a Bathroom?" ", how to approach the process of this kind of work, can't it be replaced by live broadcast? Furthermore, if everyone stays at home and chooses to use their mobile phones to "slip" works in their respective comfort zones, there is no need for face-to-face meetings, or mutual acquaintance and discussion. Can this really claim to be "participating in an exhibition"? Martian anthropologist χ began to ask questions while thinking, and did not intend to stop expressing opinions....

θ, a member of the delegation on the side, is the only one with an engineering background in this field team. He tried to come out and say: Actually, we also have a photon positioning technology, which is the kind you see in "Star Trek". As long as all the constituent structures of the object are analyzed, it is possible to force the object to be sent to our institution for research, as Groys said, "feeling the original in a way that is not the original", no matter how far away it is. Although this is a bit rude, it saves shipping costs when "borrowing"... But before he could finish his words, he was immediately slammed by the Martian anthropologist χ: θ, are you trying to lose your job? Don't you know that this technology is strictly prohibited by the ethics committee of our institution because it is too "Martian-centristic"? θ did not dare to answer, and was immediately dragged away by the other members next to him.

At this time, Φ, who is responsible for the collection of film and video works, came out to express his opinion. He said that when he was researching the past work of the River Plate Troupe, "Dream of David Woodland", he spent more time searching for the director's related deeds, and accidentally came across an interesting interview on a certain website. The content of the film is the latter's harsh criticism of those who use mobile phone screens to watch movies. As Φ spoke, he showed a 3D hologram version of the interview in front of him, and a 1:1 scale David Woodland immediately appeared in front of everyone. In the video, the big director frowned and said decisively: "Now, if you are playing movies on your mobile phone, you will never, no matter hundreds of millions of years, experience movies. You will think you are already experiencing them. .But you got duped!" After a few seconds of pause into the microphone, he continued, "It's pathetic, if you think you can watch a movie on this fucking phone! Face it! Be realistic!" (2)

After the film was broadcast, Φ continued to add: In fact, it is not difficult to understand the anger of David Lindsey, because he is obviously a supporter of the traditional film appreciation model (another well-known figure is Christopher Nolan). But we might as well take a more balanced view of this, because this trend of focusing on "art works to people" rather than "people to works of art" has a lot to do with the white-hot war between emerging streaming platforms and traditional film industries. For example, the various doubts and difficulties faced by Netflix's original films during the Oscar nomination process can highlight the huge difference between the current new audio-visual reception culture and the past. In response to this, a statement issued by Netflix actually has some truth:

"We love movies, but we also have other things we love: Provide access to movies for those who can't always afford movie tickets, or live in towns without movie theaters; make new movies available to everyone everywhere at the same time; provide filmmakers with more ways to Share your work. These things are not mutually exclusive. ”(3)

The banner that Netflix is holding high in this passage is the accessibility of art, right? It would not be a bad thing if works of art could cross the barriers of geospatial and technological thresholds and come to all who love them. In this case, why do you have to stick to a certain place and watch the video through a certain interface? Moreover, not all works have a strong site specificity, which is the case in film creation. Isn’t there a similar case in visual art? There is absolutely no need to limit "liveness" to an infinite level. Having said this, Φ has realized that his opinion is obviously different from that of the Martian anthropologist χ, who is only based on respect for his colleagues and does not immediately argue back. He then gave a relatively eclectic view: All in all, at least we can say that instead of thinking "Where should I go to see the artwork in person?", you people on Earth now care more about "through which interfaces, Seeing the artwork right away?" That question, huh?

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The visit itinerary is coming to an end here. A message from the communications officer in the alien carrier docked in orbit (he was particularly interested in Tan Wanren's "I'M LITTLE BUT I HAVE BIG DREAMS") reminding them to look out for the time left before the solar storm hits , because the captain did not want to miss the opportunity to set off with a solar sail. At this time, the head of the delegation, α, tried to come out and make a summary. He said: In fact, if the artist can make a work that brings reflection on both online browsing and on-site viewing at the same time, there is no need to mention it in the above. chose between the two positions. Just like Xie Youcheng's "Pixels and Constellation", it not only contains special discoveries that can only be found when "people go to the work", but on the other hand, it also uses the light created by paint to remind the audience that they should pay attention to this multiple screen (multiple screens). The media surrounded by screening) is aware of the reality; those tiny breaches that seem to be missing information and malfunctions are actually the breaches of reality, aren't they? After finishing speaking, he added in a low voice: To be honest, I didn't really understand what the artist was doing at first. After all, our physiological mechanism for receiving light is not the same as the eyeball structure of your earthlings. In fact, I first controlled a certain audience with my mind, and only through his eyes did I understand what was buried in "Pixels and Constellation" (the black technology of Martians, kind-hearted people on earth must not learn it.)

But in any case, this "process" of slowly discovering, experiencing, and then changing perception modes is unique in itself. In this regard, it is quite necessary that "people and works are in the same time and space". Most importantly, this "process" itself is often "cannot be given immediately": you must "pass through time" with the work, and even wait for the sequence of events contained in it to start, following the existing rhythm of the work. Walk together. This "process" cannot be accelerated and skipped arbitrarily. But in the audio and video streaming environment that you earthlings are used to, almost everything obeys the logic of "acceleration politics" that can be given immediately, can be connected instantly, quickly assembled and jumped, and the waiting time can be easily erased. This is really a pity.

Having said that, under the deep protective mask, the eyes of the regiment leader α suddenly flickered, and he said: Ah, there is a quite apt example to further illustrate. This is very much like the KTV culture that you people on earth love. In the KTV box culture, the most annoying people are often those who always love "cut songs". Because they are the group of people who most want to quickly put in the most playlists in the same consumption period, or the least respect for others' time with the microphone (you are the head of the group! Member β of the inspection team is whispering on the side.) The problem is , all life experiences (including exhibition viewing experiences) have established rhythms and speeds, which are worth elaborating and brewing. We can even say that life itself cannot be accelerated, and the only things that can be accelerated are those artistic documents that refer to and refer to life; life itself is a pure activity that cannot be arbitrarily "cut into song".

As soon as the words were finished, the head of the group α turned around and asked the other members of the delegation: Colleagues, my conclusion of "cutting songs" is not bad, right?

Member of the delegation χ: The front is okay, but the latter part is a bit hard.
Member of the delegation Φ: It's not hard, it's weak!
Member of the delegation ω: You actually just want to emphasize your expertise in studying the culture of the East Asian continent, right?
Member of the delegation β: Captain, do you know that there is a character called "Fat Tiger" in Earth's comics? Please, on your way back, don't rush to grab wheat...

Alas, you don't understand, the reason why the earthlings are so impatient is because they often fail to see the end of some works in their lifetime! I can actually feel the bad mood that they can't wait for Fu Jian Yi Bo, and artists like George R. R. Martin to write the ending of the story.

While defending himself, the head of the group led the members of the alien expedition out of the gate of the exhibition hall.
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(1) Goris Groys, translated by Guo Zhaolan and Liu Wenkun, Art Power (Taipei: Artists, 2015), p. 94.
(2) Sam Byford, “Sorry, David Lynch: watching movies on phones is pretty good now,” Retrieved September 19, 2020, from The Verge, Website: https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/30/ 15120510/movies-on-phones-david-lynch-lg-samsung
(3) Huang Yanfang reported, "Netflix Responds to Steven Spielberg: Movies and Video Streaming Platforms Are Not Mutually Exclusive", "Report" website. Website: https://www.upmedia.mg/news_info.php?SerialNo=58670 (Retrieved: September 10, 2020)