People often ask Lin Shu-min (林書民) "What is a hologram?" Lin usually refers people to those shiny things on our credit cards with the bird image in it. Lin could also point to his art, for which he uses holograms as a medium of choice.
Lin's best-known holographic work Glass Ceiling, which he started in 1996, is currently part of the Taiwan Pavilion at the 49th Venice Biennale. Using laser technology, the piece features 3D images, projected onto 3mm thick glass tiles to make the subjects appear 60cm deep.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
Lin's latest holographic project "X-ray Gods" (透視諸神), on view at the Taipei Fine Art Museum until Sept. 23, is also based on holograms, this time set suspended in the air, whereas Glass Ceiling was set on the ground. Each of the holograms is stored with three to five overlapping 3D images that can be discerned when viewed from different angles.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TFAM
Though considered a forerunner in cutting-edge digital art, Lin does not like to dwell on technical specifics. Instead, during an appearance at the Taipei museum last week to open his show, he talked openly about his feelings and how "X-Ray Gods" was conceived.
"There is so much anxiety for this new century we are in, our fate, our future and the desire to foresee what will happen. I began to think about gods and what dominates our lives," Lin said.
PHOTO: CHANG JU-PING, TAIPEI TIMES
This newest project has Lin looking to the future as opposed to Glass Ceiling, which was full of social observations based on his personal experiences in the 1990s. As a Taiwanese expatriate residing in New York, Lin offered his unique perspective on issues related to ethnicity, gender and corporate culture. "Glass Ceiling can be thought of as a search for order," says Lin in a new book titled after his own name.
Lin is now settled comfortably in his adopted city as an assistant professor at New York Institute of Technology and creative director of Holography Zone, a hub for holographic artists. The comfort with his surroundings seems to have allowed Lin to explore new thematic areas for his latest project.
"X-ray Gods" features a mix of religious and commercial icons -- Buddha, Jesus Christ, mythological images from ancient Rome, Mickey Mouse, Hello Kitty and Barbie dolls, to name a few.
The holograms are suspended in the exhibition space such that the audience must crouch to enter the framed area to view the work. Once inside, they have to look upward to view the overlapping 3D images. There is a symbolic ritual implication that goes with the body movement of lowering and raising of heads reminiscent of bowing to gods or praying. The framed area becomes a sacred place for the audience to quietly ponder matters without disturbance. In this way, Lin is asking whether religion or mass culture, with their prescribed behaviors, benefit us or inhibit us like the enclosed viewing space.
Another piece is a series of 3D images projected by a camera, each sarcastically prefixed with "St" to show their deified status. Among them are St Buzz Lightyear, St Barbie, St Godzilla, St McDonald, St Viagra and St Mannequin Baby.
"I use X-ray films for people to see familiar images from a different perspective, to see the side of something that's not revealed normally," says Lin.
Lin is perhaps especially qualified to comment on commercial culture having been an artistic director in an advertising company before moving to the US in the late 1980s.
Another work using a completely different medium is the huge video installation titled Chant x 4. Video art is a medium Lin has dabbled in recently, focusing his work on human bodies and looking at sexuality, desire and the will to take control of one's body. The video features four people rotating in a three-minute film. They are meditating, but they cannot concentrate and lose balance now and then for various reasons, such as desire and obsession. This thematic material is relevant to Lin's own life. The artist once said that if he were not an artist, he might practice Buddhism or become a spiritual healer. As it is, he's a successful artist, though clearly still searching for harmony in his life.
Lin's holograms can also be seen at two locations in the Taipei area. Metamorphosis (1998) is installed at the Taipei MRT Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall Station. Sound Pond (2000) can be found at the Panchiao Train Station.
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