A potential global system of ethics and morality must exist between our memory and the present moment, between this transitional, alternating movement, and between the lingering ghost of the past and a future that refuses to come into being when expected. –Homi K. Bhabha
Our history is not comprised of unchanging facts or truths. Our interpretation of the “past” actually illustrates our “present” values and ethics, and hence, a driving force that constitutes our “future.” Therefore, “the present moment” integrates the past and the future, and becomes an ephemeral, transient temporal unity. The participating artists in The Moment that Comes is about to Go have cast a retrospective glance to deconstruct the present, simultaneously offering their critiques and postulating a future based on a new ethics. The concept of time represented in their works is not linear; instead, it surfaces as a dynamic, alternating process, gradually progressing towards an imagined future.
KAL is a collaborative video by Szu-Han Chen and Indian artist, Vaibhav Raj Shah. The Indian title refers to both “yesterday” and “tomorrow,” which is “a day away from today.” From a philosophical perspective, this work explores the concept of time and the richly profound religious culture embedded in the Indian language. The exhibition title, The Moment that Comes is about to Go, also originates from the lyrics of an Indian ballad in the video. Another video, Tambat Ali, made during Chen’s residency in India, is her documentation of a community founded on making copperware generation after generation due to the rigid caste system. Comparing to a modern city, the video foregrounds a heterogeneous space that allows the co-existence of different times. A Short History of Decay, Shih-Chieh Lin employs the concept of inscribing history through found footage, an approach often used in experimental films. By disorienting the narrative of the video, the artist attempts to let audiences reflect upon the fact that our history might be like a binding spell, shaping our collective subconsciousness that could not be escaped. On the other hand, through the video of fictitious site, Yu-Ping Guo’s A Pit re-examines his own experience and a piece of history in Zhongxing New Village, and critically represents how Zhongxing New Village, like a special semi-colonialist zone, demonstrates a utopian life of progress and modernization to its surrounding agricultural society. In No-place I, II, III, Chiehsen Chiu discusses how human beings face reality after the end of the postmodern era, making ideals and the utopian dream an ever-lasting driving force. Shao-Gang Wang’s Teguh retraces the protagonist’s remembrance and memory of his elder brother through the narration. The linguistic narrative is overlapped with real and fictitious images. The time and space of the narration and the image constantly alternates, moving back and forth between the past and the present as well as the marginal and the center while investigating the rapid mobility and isolation predicament of migrant workers in a globalizing context.
Note: The works included in this exhibition are selected from the entries of the MOCA Video Open Call in 2015. The museum’s Exhibition Team has viewed the works and curated the thematic exhibition based on shared aspects in these works.