Taking up an entire wall in the same room was a video projection Inspired by Transliteration—Chapter Three: Wavelength, showing Li striding along the Qiantang River’s flood defenses, seen in the drone camera footage in Channel. The montage contrasts urban civil engineering to pastoral scenes with close-ups of a white horse, intermittently cutting to shots of the Qiantang’s well-known natural wonder—a tidal surge that sends majestic waves crashing against the bank, the sound of which is popularly described as a thousand horses galloping. However, the docile horse in the video defies this dramatic association, and Li’s stroll along the dangerous path of the flood barrier is at a time when the river is at rest, the montage implying that the apartment itself spreads a benign influence on its surroundings.

—in LI MING, “1703” @ Antenna Space, Shanghai
Web review by Andrew Stooke
ArtAsiaPacific

Me, We

There are a huge number of “video-making” tech products now that are drawing in people’s eyeballs—most of my life has been absorbed in this type of thing. Sometimes I see my own son crying and yelling because he wants to use the iPad or watch TV, and I think about my own childhood—I was basically just watching TV and not leaving the house. I think at some point everything that our descendants will see is art!

in Virtual Drift: Li Ming Interviewed by Yuan Fuca (read more)

In 1975 Muhammad Ali was delivering a lecture to a group of Harvard students when he was asked to recite a poem. His response –’Me, We’ –is an intense, concise message about the inherently social nature of human beings.

The artist Li Ming took Ali’s poem as the title of his 2015 solo presentation at Beijing’s UCCA, which similarly probed the limitations of individual agency. The installation-cum-exhibition featured a number of playfully disorientating elements, including an asphalt road guiding the audience through the work, a video essay that flicked quickly through groups of runners, a bright neon reading ‘ME/WE’, voice recordings and an essay by critic Guo Juan titled ‘The Appearance and Disappearance of a Group of People’ (2015). Li’s suggestion is that ‘there is no I; it is merely an illusion of existence.’ Not only was this demonstrated in the images of gaggles of joggers and the audience’s flock movement along the asphalt track, but also via the installation’s focus on somewhat ominous digital tracking technologies.

— in Frieze, “Zoom In: Li Ming’s Impromptu Responses to the Policing of Life”
By Tom Mouna, 25 JAN 2018 (read more)

Movements

Li Ming was born in 1986 inYuanjiang, China; he currently lives and works in Hangzhou, China. Videos and video installations play a significant role in Li Ming’s practice. His latest work Rendering the Mind was shot in BroadwayMansion, a five-star hotel with a storied history of over eighty years. Inspired by the shape of the building and the materials of the external walls, the artist produced a series of stories that came about in the space between the public and the private. Aside from presenting a series of relevant performances and videos, Li Ming also used the zigzag space in the museum to extend his works by linking the space up with scenes in his previous video productions, such as a subway tunnel under construction, the construction site of an art museum and a factory that produces clocks and watches. His works usually start with an image, word, movement or atmosphere that arouses his interest and ends up embodying his personal character of sensitivity, subtlety, intuition and humor. His interest shifts from the interaction between the camera and the consciousness of the viewer to the discussion of the social contexts such as spaces, edges and exits, on which the vision of his works is based. His conception of boring and even ridiculous scenes serves as a rebellion against the bored impulse, as an uneasy exploration of meaning and even as sarcasm, historically and humanely. Yet all of them have turned out to be diverse approaches to killing time.

李明（1986年出生于湖南沅江），2008年毕业于中国美术学院，现在居住并工作于杭州。录像、录像装置的运用深深植根于李明的日常创作中，他的最新作品《心渲染间》在上海大厦进行拍摄，艺术家探访了已有80年历史痕迹的五星级涉外饭店，将建筑的形状、外立面材质作为灵感基础，创作了一段介于公共和私密性相对属性空间中所发生的一系列的故事。在一系列与之有关的行为和录像作品之外，还将通过运用美术馆第五层的回形空间进行创作的延续，融合过往录像创作里涉及回形结构的场景，例如正在建设中的地铁隧道、美术馆工地、生产电子时钟的厂家等等。他的作品往往始于一个引发了他个人兴趣的图像、词语、动作或是氛围，表现了他敏感、细腻、直觉、幽默的特点，其个人关注点从摄像机与观众意识上互动，延展到着重探讨空间、边界与出口等社会语境，他的作品视野以此为基础构思出无聊甚至荒诞的不同情景，对抗无聊的冲动、关于意义的不安探索直至历史和人文层面上的讽刺，最终为消磨时光的多元化尝试。

—in Ran Dian

个人网站：www.shaoxiali.com