Sin Wai Kin, In the present day’s Prime Tales
Acquisitions Scheme: High-quality Artwork
Ferens Artwork Gallery, Hull
Sin Wai Kin is a non-binary artist who attracts on the expertise of present between mounted classes to grasp fictional narratives in regards to the social physique. They grew up in Toronto with a Hong Kong Chinese language father and White British mom, and presently works from London. Sin works throughout efficiency, shifting picture, writing, and print. Initially identified for utilizing drag, which stays an vital a part of their observe to deal with themes, comparable to want, identification, objectification, and binaries.
In the present day’s Prime Tales and Island Universe are a pairing of a movie and make-up wipe. Sin makes references to Zhuangzi’s ‘Dream of a Butterfly’, a Taoist philosophical provocation which tells the story of Zhuang Zhou, a person who one night time went to sleep and dreamed he was a butterfly. When he wakes, he asks himself the query “Was I Zhuang Zhou dreaming I used to be a butterfly or am I now a butterfly dreaming I’m Zhuang Zhou?”.
In the present day’s Prime Tales takes the type of a surreal information broadcast. As an alternative of studying factual information, the Storyteller studies on philosophical propositions on existence, consciousness, naming and id. The Storyteller is a personality performed by Sin, recurring of their work. The video turns into distorted because it goes on, with glitches and voice edits growing in frequency. This additional builds on the concept that actuality can usually be indistinguishable from phantasm, not not like the rumors and propagandic information accounts we encounter each day.
Island Universe is a make-up wipe, a product of the cautious removing of the make-up Sin wore because the Storyteller within the video In the present day’s Prime Tales. The wipe, as an alternative of being disposed turns into an artwork object. By way of this act the character is put into stasis. On the identical time Sin exhibits how identities might be placed on and eliminated like an article of clothes.
Ferens Artwork Gallery has a devoted fashionable and modern gallery which has a big assortment of portraiture and research of the human determine. Sin Wai Kin’s work is one other type of self-portraiture, providing higher illustration to its guests. The acquisition coincides with a programme exploring id which is curated by younger folks aged 18-25 from The Warren Youth Mission and Future Ferens.
Sin Wai Kin (b. Toronto, Canada, 1991) lives and works in London. Latest solo exhibitions embrace Somerset Home, London; The Guggenheim, New York (each 2022); Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong (2021); Delicate Opening, London (2020). Latest group exhibitions embrace Tate Liverpool (2022/23); The British Museum, London; ICA, Los Angeles, USA (each 2022); LIMA, Amsterdam; 65th BFI London Movie Competition; Polygon Gallery, North Vancouver (all 2021). They’ve been nominated for the Turner Prize 2022.
Written by Efea Rutlin, Curatorial Trainee at Up to date Artwork Society.
