As an artist who uses performance, installation and video as her medium of creation, Lindsay Lee’s works are always centered on the issues of women, body and personal identity. Her creations break the boundaries of traditional media, flowing between performance, installation and video, exploring the possibilities of expression of the body as a subject in repetitive actions, and combining elements of participatory behavior and theater to construct a unique cross-media artistic language.
Linxi’s work is deeply influenced by her personal experience and cross-cultural background. From her identity as a rural woman in Southwest China to her study and living experiences in France and Sweden, her works attempt to find a balance between the contradictory states of improvisation and repetition, private and public, natural and artificial, outlining a profound reflection on mobility, identity and the body.
“NIGHT SCHOOL NY INSIGHT” Vol. 51
Starting From Performance, Exploring Personal Identity Under Mobility
Lecture: Linxi Li
Host：Jody Huang
19:30-21:30, Feb 28th, 2025 (Fri)
Sponsor: UP-ON Performance Art Archive
B.A. and M.A. from the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Limoges, France, and participated in the TKR Master’s exchange program at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Received several national scholarships from China, France and Sweden. Her works have been exhibited in France, China and Sweden. Currently lives and works in Chengdu and France. The cross-cultural experiences of studying and living in China, France and Sweden have enriched her understanding and reflection on her personal identity as a rural woman in southwest China. Her cross-media artistic language, which is composed of a collage of different media such as performance, installation and video, allows her to free herself from the limitations of location, material and culture in a fluid way of creation. The constant jumps and combinations between improvisation and repetition, nature and artifice, private and public, stillness and movement, etc., outline her thoughts on the body, women, mobility and other issues in the present time.
《Dear Daughter, My Dream Is…》2022 Fabric, cardboard, steel, etc.
Performance, 35min
Dals Långed，Sweden
It is a 35-minute almost theatrical performance art piece consisting of 5 parts and 5 participants. At that time, I was on an exchange program at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. Compared to France, Swedish universities are very strict about graduate thesis requirements, and such strictness forced me to research my grandmother, mother and me through my personal life history in my graduate thesis “Mamie, Mamom et Moi (Grandma, Mom and Me)”. In “Mamie, Mamom et Moi (Grandma, Mamom and Me),” I researched the history of rural women in the south of China since the founding of New China. In the course of this research, I asked my grandmother and mother, “What is a woman?” This question became the main thread in the creation of this work. This theoretical research was like a lighthouse that guided my direction during the months of creation. It was also during the creation of this work that I realized and found my own creative habits, rhythm and language. I did all the lighting, costumes, scene content, etc.
I did all the work. And all the parts of the work can be taken out individually, and they can exist as individual works, not just as “decoration/functionality”. In this work I reinforce my own creative language of jumping between improvisation and setting, private and public, truth and falsehood, and other elements that are full of tension and contradiction.
《Plastic Surgery Hospital 》 2021, Performance, 13min
fabric, ceramic, etc.
In 2015 I underwent a nose job at the decision of my family, which inspired me to create a series of works. I created a series of works inspired by this decision. 2018-2019 I stood on the streets of Chengdu and Dunkirk (France) as a plastic surgeon in the performance work “A Dollar to Touch a Fake Nose”, throwing the topic of plastic surgery to the passers-by in a public context. 2020 I revisited this experience and made 250 white ceramic noses modeled after mine in a month. In 2020 I revisited the experience and in one month made 250 white ceramic noses modeled after my own. Whose nose is this? What is a good-looking nose? Who decides what is good looking? In 2021, I created “linxiland”, a 4-meter-high, 70-square-meter installation made of photographs, fabrics, and other materials. The “linxiland” is a stand-alone installation and a container for the work “Plastic Surgery Hospital”. The work is divided into three parts: the first part is the “tour guide”, LINXI, dressed in red (like the doll she made) and holding a microphone, acts as a tour guide, introducing “linxi” in the third person and guiding the tour of “linxiland”. The second part of the program is the “Counseling Room”.
Three women from different countries, one of them stands in front of a pink wall and randomly takes down a ceramic nose from the wall (made by remodeling LINXI’s nose) and she asks the other two girls: “Do you think this is a beautiful nose? Do you think it’s a nice nose?” The two girls randomly answered.” YES / NO”. If the answers are the same, she puts the nose back on the wall. If the answers are different, she smashes it with a pink hammer. This cycle continues for three minutes. Part 3: “The Operating Theater”. The doctor takes turns asking the “ client” in the chair about his or her plastic surgery needs and then performs plastic surgery on him or her.
《Je prends tous les plaisirs pour moi / I keep all the pleasure to myself》2023
balloons, plastic film, hydrogen, transparent fishing line Dimensions variable (image size 2 m * 10 m)
InstallationIn this work I look for fluidity between creator and viewer, between static installation and dynamic behavior. I share the right of ownership of the work with the viewer, everyone can touch and move the installation as they wish. When someone walks around it, even the slightest movement creates a very delicate and rich ripple on the installation. In addition to people, any element in the space: wind, light, etc. are all involved in the work. This lightness and flow with great uncertainty creates great richness.
