Strike

Title: Strike
Medium: Metal chain, burlap fiber, red silk, cotton, sound electronic system
Dimensions:196x48x86cm
Year：2020/2025

In this interactive installation, I subvert the symbolic authority of the traditional Buddhist temple bell hammer by transforming it into a soft, humorous, and oddly vulnerable object. A 2-meter-long fabric cylinder filled with sponge and fiber is suspended in mid-air by two chains. Its drooping form resembles a phallic figure — limp, almost comical. When viewers swing it forcefully against the wall, a hidden trigger plays the recorded sound of a real temple bell, producing a surprisingly sacred and pleasurable moment.
This work cannot exist without the audience. Each strike becomes a ritual they perform. By altering the materiality and function of a culturally loaded object, I question the existence of people and things before they are named or socially defined. The piece resists fixed meaning — it slips between strength and fragility, absurdity and reverence, intimacy and institutional power.
Viewers are not just participants, but co-creators. Their bodies animate the work, transforming it from passive sculpture into an active exchange. It is a meditation on the theatricality of power and the softness behind what we’re taught to perceive as serious. Through exaggeration and estrangement, I invite a playful yet critical reflection on how cultural symbols shape — and fail to contain — human experience.

在这件互动装置中，我将佛教寺庙中庄严肃穆的敲钟锤转化为一个柔软、幽默又富有挑衅意味的物体。这个两米长、由海绵与纤维填充的圆柱体悬挂于半空，因其弯曲下垂的形态令人联想到男性性器官，既脆弱又滑稽。当观众用力摇晃它撞击墙面时，装置内部的按钮会触发真实的钟声录音，营造出意外的神圣感。
这是一件必须通过观众参与才能完成的作品。每一次撞击都让钟声成为由观众亲手唤起的事件。通过重新设定这个“锤子”的材质与功能，我质疑那些被赋予仪式感和权威象征的物件，在社会赋名之前的存在状态。我试图打破功能与形式的边界，让荒谬、脆弱、亲密与权力之间的张力在作品中显现出来。

观众不仅是使用者，也是创作者。他们身体的介入，激活了装置，使之从静态物体转变为一种动态关系。这是一场由陌生感引发的思辨——我们为何如此相信权威之物的不可触碰？又该如何重新理解那些看似庄严却本质柔软的力量？

This work is showing at a group show "艺术家请客” organized by ShanghArt Gallery香格纳画廊 and the Hol Art platform 洞 in Shanghai during Shanghai Artweek at an abandon primary school.

Please click the video to play the sound (very important)