Bloated City | Skinny Language (version II)2007 / Interactive InstallationHung Keung + imhk lab  Today's Chinese cities are transforming from a traditional model into today's high-tech areas, just as Chinese characters transformed from traditional characters into simplified characters. For me, a Chinese born in China and raised in Hong Kong, this creates conflicting desires, making you to feel love and hate all at once. On the one hand, you want to know more about this new China, you always want it to move faster, but on the other hand, you feel nostalgic and want it to move forward only slowly. Bloated City | Skinny Language is an interactive art installation in which the audience is recorded in real time and sees two images of itself on two projection screens. At the same time, there are numerous Chinese characters floating in these projections which act like insects chasing the audience. The behaviors of these ‘bugs’ are totally different on the left and right screens. The audience will encounter a different experience about "change or unchanged", "move or stay", "to be or not to be". Standing amidst this impressive installation, you can see two images of yourself simultaneously. The further you walk away from your image on the left side, the "complex and simplified" follow you even faster. Yet at the same time, the further you walk away from your image on the right side, the more "complex and simplified" are unable to follow you. These two dissimilar situations unfold simultaneously in front of your eyes. You use your body to feel a contradiction, which is exactly the experience of wanting to get close and far that the artist wishes to express. (Hung Keung) Hung Keung (born 1970, China) graduated from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (1992), the Chinese University of Hong Kong (1995), and the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design (1997). He was a Visiting Scholar at the ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe (2001-2002) and is currently a PhD candidate at the University of the Arts in Zurich, Switzerland. In recent years, Hung Keung has participated in many local and overseas festivals. He was awarded numerous prizes including the Best Short Ambient Video Award at the BBC British Film Festival (1998); the Best of EMAF at the European Media Art Festival Germany (1998); Special Mention Interactive CDROM Award at e-phos, The 3rd International Festival of Film & New Media on Art held in Athens, Greece (2002). Between 1999 and 2007, he received the Gold Award and a Special Mention at the Hong Kong Independent Short Film and Video Awards, and the Best of Code Award at the Microwave International New Media Arts Festival. He was awarded DAAD Scholarship (2002) and ACC Fellowship (2005) as a Visiting & Research Scholar in Germany and the United States. In 2004, Hung Keung founded imhk lab in Hong Kong, with involvement of new media art research in interactive Chinese Characters and dual screens imaging. · www.hungkeung.hk/  Hung Keung, imhk lab, Bloated City / Skinny Language (version II), 2007, Interactive Installation, 2 projectors, camera, PC, loaned by the artist |