Days in the Matchbox: Apr.2-Apr.6 2018

Every day is burnt match. 

“But in the corner, leaning against the wall, sat the little match girl with red cheeks and smiling mouth, frozen to death on the last evening of the old year. The New Year’s sun rose upon a little pathetic figure. The child sat there, stiff and cold, holding the matches, of which one bundle was almost burned. No one imagined what beautiful things she had seen, and how happily she had gone with her old grandmother into the bright New Year.”    - <The little match girl>, Christian Andersen

Gallery open hours:

Apr.2 Monday   1pm-5pm 捕捉 capture

Apr.3 Tuesday   3pm-5pm 移徙 moving

Apr.4 Wednesday   11am-1pm 安床 Bed Placement

Apr.5 Thursday    11am-3pm 出行 Travel

Apr.6 Friday    -Closed-

The thesis exhibition, Days in the Matchbox: Apr.2-Apr.6.2018, is a body of project that references and follows the Fortune Calendar. The Fortune Calendar, also called “Yellow Calendar”, and “All Knowing Book”, was a calendar published by the emperor to guide agriculture in ancient times. In Contemporary China, the calendar primarily functions as a guideline for selecting dates and times for events. It reflects the idea of respecting nature and the universe, and also provides the good wishes in the face of constant uncertainties. The exhibition follows the Fortune Calendar in terms of time, space and events. Taking the analogy of match as every day, four body-size matchboxes are stacked in the center of the gallery. As the day proceeds, each matchbox is put down at a specific position as the calendar guides in the gallery space. Each piece of work contained in the matchbox is based on the suggested activity for the day written on the calendar.

Apr.2, Monday, the first day of the thesis show, has a matchbox functioning as a pinhole camera that captures the open hours, 1-5pm, in the gallery. And the contact print is hung on the wall on the next day. 

Apr.3, Tuesday, the second day of the show, in response to the event: moving, presenting 6 shipping boxes of dated matchboxes with one burnt match in each one of them since my birthday. During the open hours, 3-5pm, I perform gestures of packing and unpacking with them.

Apr.4, Wednesday, the third day of the show, represents bed placement, which culturally refers to the ceremonial bed placement in the new place especially on occasions of wedding. The matchbox contains a mural print of the contact sheet of 35mm negatives of beds in different positions in a bedroom.

Apr.5, Thursday, the fourth day of the show, opens from 11am to 3pm, follows the event of travelling. A video is projected into the matchbox. The content of the video is I jumping the hopscotch game with a soundtrack of me reading times at different time zones and trying to catch up time.

Apr.6 is a day for nothing appropriate to do, so there is no work shown for the day.