In this interview, we speak to Ruo Wei,she creates work within the department of Fine Art.
What is the title of your work?
"Rose is a Rose is a Rose".
Summarise the work in 5 words
Does identity change through time?
Talk us through the process of creating your work
A distorted space is displayed in the work. Line drawings, derived from surrounding sounds, were overlapping and continuously merging with the space. The whole composition was to resemble a uncertain status of identity. As the line drawings are eventually worn off, I wanted to emphasize on the pasture of time and trying to question whether identity would be lost or not if memories of a specific person, space or time is taken over.
I worked on capturing moving sounds from surrounding environment and transform them into simple graphical lines. While doing these mark makings, I hoped to record how the sources move from one side to the other, how they are created when objects have impact with each other, and how to would have possibly fade out. Trying to be more audio dependent, I blind folded myself so my outcomes would be solely influenced by what I hear. Having series of drawings and also documentation of the process, I experimented with different methods of collaging the materials to create a virtual space.
How is the work site-specific?
I guess my work is time specific in the way how I’m trying to reference the “lost” of memories through the change in sounds through time. It’s really interesting how the things we perceive, sounds, space and people, they never exist the same twice. This is a similar situation regarding to Theseus paradox; how do you know someone is still what it is if they gradually change with respect to time? Is the identity of this person constructed based on our existing memories? I think capture of every instinct moment of the surrounding sounds is how my make my work to be time specific.
You can follow Rose Wei on instagram at @wr_rose_519