WeChat|WeiXin
Studio D: University of North Texas
Denton | Hangzhou
3.16.20-3.20.20
The below protocol simply attempts to produce, within a fixed number of hours, a combinatory effect of images and poetry, be it as it may.
As chance would have it, a relationship has formed between individuals at University of North Texas and Hangzhou Normal University. This presents a technical and social impasse for international communication. WeChat is the preferred social platform within China, but is little utilized without. This protocol intends to explore the potential of WeChat to explore not international communication per se, but the fraught juxtaposition of images and poetic text, taking advantage of WeChat’s translation function.
The experimental protocol is about using chance encounters on social media to find relationships between shared “content” as the basis for creating. It will alternate daily between sharing an image one day, and pairing shared images to create a short poem that 破题 or “cracks the essence” of the relationship between them. (Google translates this as “Breaking the Title”!) Participants will repeat this until they have “broken the title” three times. If social media tends to become a stream of endless content, this experiment is an attempt to mine it for its underlying creative potential.
With Jun Hu, Art Education graduate students at Hangzhou Normal University, Guangzhou Art Academy, and the University of North Texas