The weight of language

IP YUK-YIU’S BOOK OF A HUNDRED GHOSTS

Book of a Hundred Ghosts

Most of the time, virtual reality is a solitary experience, designed for a viewer who engages with it by means of a heavy headset that rests over the eyes. Barring headsets of their own, the people next to you likely have no idea what three-dimensional world you’re seeing. In a sense, VR is like a technologically induced out-of-body experience. It takes you someplace else.

“I have a lot of doubts about the technology, at least at this stage,” said Hong Kong-based multimedia artist Ip Yuk-yiu about his immersive VR project, Book of a Hundred Ghosts. He normally doesn’t work with VR, but it was the ideal medium to realize a vision he sought to express. Book of a Hundred Ghosts approximates the experience of being buried under the individual characters of a written language that fall from the sky. His intent was to reimagine VR as something that makes you more aware of your body, rather than taking you out of it.

“It is quite disturbing, in a way,” he said of the project. “It’s quite physical, very visceral. You have characters falling on top of you. I always have this dream — it’s a very simple dream — of being crushed by these characters, especially Chinese characters, being Chinese myself. This project originated from this idea, or desire, to be crushed by Chinese words — literally.”

This year represents the second time that Yuk-yiu has shown his work at Currents. He previously exhibited Plastic Garden, a single-channel video, in 2014. He is an associate professor at the School of Creative Media City at Hong Kong’s City University.

Yuk-yiu sought to make Book of a Hundred Ghosts a more physical and more realistic VR experience for the participant than one that’s purely visual. Rather than sitting or standing — the way a person normally experiences VR — spectators are prostrate, viewing the falling characters from a more vulnerable position. What one sees is the black forms tumbling down and landing, as though directly on top of themselves, until little by little, the light is entirely obliterated from view and the burial is complete.

“The work has a very strong Chinese root, but I think it’s quite universal,” he said. “The experience is quite spectacular, but it’s crushing. But it’s kind of, quote unquote, pleasurable. It’s kind of S and M.” The participant may feel an adrenaline rush, and a mix of fear and anticipation. One’s instinct may be to try to shield oneself with one’s hands or, possibly, to remain open and immobile, testing one’s endurance.

Yuk-yiu also expands the VR experience into something that can be observed by others, too, even if they’re not wearing the headset. There are multiple components. A video projection on the wall shows what the person lying down is seeing. The person lying down is also projected on from above, so an outside observer can see the accumulation of characters as they come tumbling down on the body.

But Book of a Hundred Ghosts also has a more conceptual component. Language is, itself, a limited means of expression, and we are constrained by it. Yuk-yiu chose characters from traditional Chinese writing in addition to a simplified version. “The traditional ones are used in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the simplified versions are used in mainland China,” he said. Together, both forms represent the standard character sets of contemporary Chinese written language. “This is my first full VR project,” he said. “I work with other technology, cinema, and video games as well. In a way, this one has a relationship with my current interest in video games. It’s kind of a playable experience.” — Michael Abatemarco

“I always have this dream of being crushed by these characters, especially Chinese characters, being Chinese myself. This project originated from this idea, or desire, to be crushed by Chinese words.” — artist Ip Yuk-yui