Interval

Interval was made as Bai moved from visual communication into contemporary art. Following changes in his hearing, he began exploring meditation and mysticism and became drawn to the formal structures of astronomical, geographical, and esoteric images. At the same time, he repeatedly entered Shenzhen arcades, gathering still and moving images and recording the sounds produced by machines, players, and the rooms around them.

Five groups of photographic lightboxes and a video with sound recombine this field material with astronomical diagrams and esoteric symbols removed from their original explanations. Mechanical details from game machines, images, location sound, and electronic music enter the same structure. The lightboxes hold illuminated fragments in place, while the moving image unfolds them through another duration.

The interval exists between the installations, but also between the original site, a symbol’s earlier meaning, and its new arrangement. Bai did not describe the process as fieldwork at the time. Looking back, however, entering an environment, observing, photographing, listening, collecting, and later reorganizing material through his own visual and technical systems already anticipates a method that would recur in later works.