Unlike the rest of the works in the exhibition, Linear Perspective by Teng Yen Lin had to be recreated from scratch by the artist (and a lot of helpers). Yen Lin reflects on the experience of doing her coursework all over again:
“If one thing can be said about my work, it is this: Linear Perspective has definitely not been a solo effort! My thanks and gratitude goes out to Mr Chia, for the long hours, advice, equipment, and help unquantifiable; my brother KY, for coming down on countless occasions; art class – Ben, Yong Feng, Berny, Jon, for dropping by and lending more than a hand despite being busy with NS and work; Ellen and Ai Lin for all your time and help; my juniors Justin, Rebecca, Yutian, Tzeqing (and Abigail!) for getting your hands dirty scrubbing at walls, and everyone else who has helped in one way or another. This work is yours as much as it is mine.
On another note, this exhibition made it clear to me what site-specific really meant. I’d always thought that it meant that a work had to be constructed again, from scratch, when transported to a different location. True, but I found it’s not just that! Recreating my work at 8Q was hardly a matter of transplanting the original, from the RJ gallery, into this new space. Instead, a lot of time was spent creating this work around the space I was presented with. I guess the word ‘recreating’ sums it up neatly – the idea of creating anew. For I found that as much as I had taken the work at RJ as a blueprint for the one at 8Q, what I ended up with was a rather different piece! In other words, site-specific = this work being specific to this particular site. And when the site changes, the work changes too.
And the change in space has made all the difference. Some things I had created in RJ I couldn’t bring here, but some ideas that I simply couldn’t have used back there were now made possible. Take the door, for example. The partitions allowed for the door to straddle two surfaces (and the gap between them), to create an image that the audience could actually interact with/be immersed in. Think I’ll stop here for now, because words are beginning to seem inadequate! Instead, I’d just like to say that many exciting things have happened in this new work, which you will be able to understand regardless of whether you’ve seen the previous version or not. (: So I hope you’ll come down, have a look for yourself, and take delight in what lines – and a bit of black tape – can do.”
