Hsiao-Chu (Julia)
Hsia
夏
小筑
back-and-forth
2025
Crossing Art, New York, NY, USA
A part of the group show A Story That Lives Within US, curated by Tzu-Ying (Naomi) Chan.
back-and-forth is a multimedia piece with an on-site installation and a performance, using the video projection to bring out immigrant experiences and stories in a formed space. The work responds to the artist’s self-identification as an immigrant living overseas, away from the hometown, visualizing traveling traces between points with wire curves bouncing in the space and moving images from a window view. It interprets the inevitable experience encountered by every individual who has a goal to keep moving forward and a home to go back to. As the clock ticks, the time passes by without notice, and the views voyagers see on the way pass in seconds yet take a great part in our running lifetime.
Photo Credit: Yu-Yu Demi Chen
Rugged wires emphasize the traces between dots and dots in the space, with irregular fragments on them representing episodes that could happen during the trip. Sometimes a journey is a goodbye to someone, yet a new connection to another one when crossing paths. Stories happen when the views from the window pass.
The projected video contains moving images from a window view, captured by the artist, with ticking sounds expressing the consumed time throughout traveling. Regular clips were mixed with mirrored and reversed ones to smooth the travel directions. It served as the background visual and sound for the performance.
Photo Credit: Yu-Yu Demi Chen
The performance invites the audience to join a “journey”, using the installation as the stage, like a bed at a capsule hotel, a station platform, and a row of seats in a train or a plane, to share trivial moments in an improvisational and spontaneous trip as the artist moves around the space. Greeting and waiting, photos and small talks during travels with friends or strangers only meeting once.
Two props made with copper wire were used in the performance to connect with the audience and address interaction. Two hand-sized flat artifacts show the screen of a music-streaming page and a camera frame, which are the most common functions people would use during traveling, inviting participants to be a part of the piece, starting with taking photos together in the space.
Photo Credit: Yu-Yu Demi Chen