Park for the people | 2021 OCAT SZ Biennale
Urban Activism | Public Art | Place Making
Jason Ho Mapping Workshop,
Collaborators: Yi Gong, Zhuore Liu, Tian Yun,
Instrutor: Jason Ho
Park for the people was a exhibition in 2021 OCAT Shenzhen Biennale, situated in the OCT park, Shenzhen.
The workshop was aiming at provokotively thinking about alternative ways to interact with conventional perception of Art.
Residents often thinks of Daniel Buren’s work as obstacles and useless objects within the park.
So, how can we start to let the sculptures work out in the park?
As we found out that residents in surroundsing neighborhoods love to walk their dogs in the park, we start to talk with them and ask about their stories within the park.
A beautiful Samoe had a story of standing on top of Daniel Buren’s work as if it was a stage triggered our attention and we started to invite all the doggs on the stage.
The idea was to put a fake dog on a mock-up sculpture standing next to Daniel's.
First, people who passed by the columns would be wondering about whether the dog they just saw is real or not.
This is the step to let people notice the existence of columns.
After that, they would started to think about puting their own dogs on the columns, which is to activate their potential of appropriation.
But after the Biennale begins, thing got a little bit out of control. Still, I'm gald to withness all of this, and the people started to engage in the public space more actively.
Kids started their own transplatation. It was actually quite successful in terms of taking people's eyes on the columns and dogs as well as engagement in the public space and public life. We agreed to keep the dog flexible instead of fixing it to a certain one.
In a winter evening, our be-loved fake dog was stolen by some kids. But we thought it was totally fine, because they really take possession of the public space now.