chain chance change
2015-2017
installation including:
a video and an independent sound channel 22:33 minutes
residue of a durational performance: wearing one set of synthetic silk
pijamas 24/7 from 1st June til 1st September 2015, travelling from Vietnam to Europe
a collection of readymade objects: antique stools, antique trinket, devaluated coins, old ballerinas
chain chance change is the inaugural performance of Cam Xanh. Marking a metamorphosis from wife, mother and long-term art collector to artist, the work sees Cam Xanh create a critical distance from both previous incarnations of her identity and society at large. By continuously wearing the same silk pyjamas for the duration of the three-month performance, Cam Xanh blurs the lines between the public and private spheres: effectively taking the world to bed each night, before getting in bed with the world each day. Playing with this notion of sleepwalking, the artist embeds questions of the self, transformation and autonomy within a wider social commentary that is quietly suggestive but without force or imposition. Exhibited together as installation, video work and performance residue, Chain Chance Change combines multiple elements to create space for reflection on a larger whole.
Installation description
A ghost lingers in the room, or the feeling of one just departed. It is the absence of a presence that we feel. The figure from the video is spectral, her intangibility emphasised by the line of antique stools that run through the projection wall. The stools repeat in rigorous order, like the tick-tock of a clock. They extend the room into the video, and out the other side, but leave the spectre trapped in limbo: between life and death, past and present, wakefulness and sleep. Beyond the projection wall, one stool in the sequence lies ambiguously flat—impossible to say whether it succumbed by accident or violence, it becomes an unknowable entity. Her pyjamas, the remnants of her physical being, now hang loosely from the wall. Dressed for bed, the figure lays lethargically amongst the stools. The camera’s dolly zoom creates a back-and-forward motion of motionlessness that only accentuates a feeling of being stuck. Just like the pyjamas, the closed metal trunk and red mask of Ares appear in the corner of the room. Their doubling emphasises the room’s uncanniness, their stillness contrasting with the vertigo-inducing film effect. The closed trunk and the mythology of the stars: more unknowable entities. What do we carry with us and what makes us who we are? Who were we before we were born and how much choice do we have in who we become? Echoes of past selves reach into the room as a soundtrack of disembodied voices. In turns, a woman reads a poem and a girl sings a song. Their voices float, haunting and timeless.