
-
- Wu Tsang is an artist.
WU TSANG - THERE IS NO NONVIOLENT WAY TO LOOK AT SOMEBODY (solo)
OVERVIEW
Date | ... closes in 33 day(s)Sep 4, 2019 - Jan 12, 2020 |
---|---|
Opening | Sep 4, 2019, Wednesday |
Venue(s) |
Martin Gropius Bau (Berlin, Germany) |
Curator(s) | Clare Molloy, Stephanie Rosenthal |
Artist(s) | Wu Tsang |
Organizer(s) |
Martin Gropius Bau (Berlin, Germany) |
EXHIBITION SYNOPSIS
About Wu TSANG - There is no nonviolent way to look at somebodyWu Tsang’s solo exhibition "There is no nonviolent way to look at somebody" presents films in dialogue with her sculptural practice, working with the interaction of glass, light and text, and including a new stained-glass commission conceived for the Gropius Bau.
With its hybrid cinematic language, Wu Tsang’s new film "One emerging from a point of view" examines the present and the political, dealing especially with the experience of migration. Filmed on the Greek island of Lesbos, it addresses the current situation that the landscape and islanders have been confronted with: the trauma of forced displacement. In 2015 alone, over 850,000 refugees reached Greece, many arriving at the shores of the island Lesbos, having travelled over the sea to flee war and untenable political circumstances. Documenting within this context, Wu Tsang employs a magical realist approach, allowing the boundaries between fact, fiction and surreal narrative to be intentionally fluid. What has commonly been referred to as a “refugee crisis” is structurally encountered in the film as a crisis of representation.
Stemming from traditions of documentary filmmaking, her approach to the moving image is a central aspect of the exhibition. "One emerging from a point of view" is screened via two overlapping video projections where images cut and bleed into each other, a technique also seen in the 2017 film "We hold where study". Both films use rigorous camera choreography to entangle disparate worlds and psychological spaces, revealing an indeterminate “third” space, which is produced through the overlapping projections.
"We hold where study" (2017) presents choreographic duets in which bodies press against one another and fall in and out of entanglement. Here, Wu Tsang proposes a visual vocabulary that poetically approaches practices of blackness and queerness, responding to an essay called "Leave Our Mikes Alone" by Stefano Harney and Fred Moten, one of her long-term collaborators.
Collaboration as a strategy for entering into what she terms “in-betweenness” is an integral part of Wu Tsang’s practice. In her works she consciously layers the gestures, words and voices of others, allowing multiple perspectives to emerge.
Curated by Stephanie Rosenthal with Clare Molloy.
Wu TSANG’s films, installations, performances, and sculptures move fluidly between documentary, activism, and fiction. Her projects have been presented at museums and film festivals internationally, including MoMA (New York), Tate Modern (London), Stedelijk Museum (Amsterdam), MCA (Chicago), MOCA (Los Angeles), Berlinale Film Festival (Berlin), SANFIC (Santiago), Hot Docs Festival (Toronto), and South by Southwest Film Festival (Austin). Her first feature film WILDNESS (2012) premiered at MoMA’s Documentary Fortnight, and her work was also featured in the 2012 Whitney Biennial, “The Ungovernables” New Museum Triennial in New York and the 9th Berlin Biennale. She has received grants from John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, Creative Capital, the Warhol Foundation, and the Rockefeller and Guggenheim Foundations.
Born in 1982 in Worchester, US, she currently lives and works in Los Angeles.
WORKS (4)

Sudden Rise, Chapter 3(Series: works with no series), 2019
painting, Acid etched Lamberts flashed glass, leaded, 825x1700x10mm
ARTIST: Wu Tsang

Chapter 6(Series: works with no series), 2019
painting, Acid etched Lamberts flashed glass, leaded, 825x1700x10mm
ARTIST: Wu Tsang

One emerging from a point of view(still)(Series: works with no series), 2019
painting, 2-Channel Overlapping Projections, 5.1 Surround Sound,, 43:00
ARTIST: Wu Tsang

One emerging from a point of view(still)(Series: works with no series), 2019
2-Channel Overlapping Projections, 5.1 Surround Sound, 43:00
ARTIST: Wu Tsang
ONGOING(1)
- Wu TSANG - There is no nonviolent way to look at somebody (artist, solo)
2019.09.04 - 2020.01.12
... closes in 33 day(s)
Martin Gropius Bau(1)(4)
2019(1)
- Look for Me All Around You@Sharjah Biennial 14 - Leaving the Echo Chamber (artist, art fair)
2019.03.07 - 2019.06.10
... closed
Sharjah Art Foundation(27)
2017(2)
- Wu TSANG - Sustained Glass (artist, solo)
2017.09.23 - 2017.11.02
... closed
Antenna Space(1)(19)(1) - The New Normal - China, Art, and 2017 (artist, group)
2017.03.19 - 2017.07.09
... closed
Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) (Beijing)(1)(1)
2016(1)
- 9th Berlin Biennale For Contemporary Art (artist, intl event)
2016.06.04 - 2016.09.18
... closed
Akademie Der Kunste (AdK)
Blue-Star
ESMT European School of Management and Technology
KW Institute for Contemporary Art
The Feuerle Collection(1)(101)(64)
2015(1)
- America Is Hard to See - Get Rid of Yourself (artist, group)
2015.05.01 - 2015.09.27
... closed
Whitney Museum of American Art(1)(12)
2014(1)
- Don’t You Know Who I Am? Art After Identity Politics (artist, group)
2014.06.14 - 2014.09.14
... closed
Muhka, Museum Van Hedendaagse Kunst Antwerpen(1)
2012(1)
- Whitney Biennial 2012 (artist, intl event)
2012.03.01 - 2012.05.27
... closed
Whitney Museum of American Art (old museum)(1)(27)(5)(55)