Jaxton Su, image still from Tropical Reveries - A place for everyone, 2021. Image courtesy of the artist.
Cyborg Thinks is a collaborative art exchange project by Singaporean artists Jaxton Su and Lynette Quek, and South Korean artists Jieun Gu and Darae Baek, which examines the correlations between the cyber and physical world – their tools, contexts, and boundaries, in an attempt to form an archive of shared knowledge across Singapore and South Korea as the artists explore everyday human experiences and issues that typically go unnoticed in the contemporary world.
The process-driven collaboration commenced as a fictional digital broadcasting station, where the artists regularly shared and transmitted their encounters, research and observations digitally, based on sixty specific sites located in Ulsan and Singapore. Culminating into a two-part exhibition happening in both cities, an exciting array of experimental works including interactive installations, vibrant collages and immersive new media art were created through the distinct adaptation, reinterpretation, and visualisation of the various digital and analogue data collected by the four artists. The Ulsan edition of the exhibition is currently ongoing at the newly established Jangsaengpo Culture Depot, and will be showing till 30 June 2021, while the exhibition in Singapore will be happening from 26 June to 17 July 2021 at Tzu Chi Humanistic Youth Centre, with guided media previews on 25 June 2021.
Through a hybrid of on-site research and online exchange that work against physical and geographical barriers, the artists were able to directly explore their home country on behalf of their overseas collaborators, as well as indirectly discover about an unfamiliar city from a different lens via digital means. The Singaporean artists acted as avatars for the Korean artists and vice versa, conducting research in another’s stead based on instructions and questions posted prior to the site expeditions, eventually helping to fulfill artistic visions of another by transforming them into physical artworks. This forms a multidimensional collaborative system that encourages new possibilities to manifest within the artists’ research and artworks. Some of the key issues investigated by the artists include alienation, digital culture, urban development and environmental degradation.
Venue: Tzu Chi Humanistic Youth Centre 30A Yishun Central 1, Singapore 768796
When: 26 Jun - 17 Jul 2021,
By: n/a
