Only 40 years old, he became one of the greatest artists in this era

Ed Atkins, Ed Atkins,

British artist,

Only 40 years old, but by the famous curator

Hans-Ulrich Obrist evaluation

"One of the greatest artists in our time."

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Artist Ed Atkins

(Picture source: sseense)

He is famous for his image,

The most private personal story and emotions,

For example, father’s diary, inner anxiety, obsession with literature, etc.,

It is presented through digital means.

He will use the cutting -edge computer technology and face capture technology,

Manufacturing high simulation video works,

Let's explore "false" and "true",

The connection between "artificial" and "nature".

He is also a writer and poet,

Technology and literature,

Combined in a very unique way.

Therefore, the strong "depression" in the work,

It will make people look unconscious and uneasy.

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The exhibition "useless things" scene

His first exhibition of Asia "Unexical Things"

It is conducting at the Shanghai Oil Art Center,

Taking this opportunity,

We interviewed Atkins in a connected line,

Learn about this artist who belongs to the future in the eyes of everyone.

Self -report: Ed Atkins

Edit: Tan Yibai

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Atkins at work

(Source: Louisiana Channel)

I grew up in a small village named Stonefield in Oxford. My mother was a art teacher in a public school and my father was a graphic designer. There are only 800 people in the village. This is a terrible thing in adolescence. Whoever knows each other with each other.

But in my home, we are like a small world of our own. My parents and brothers, four of them, all of them like art and literature, classical drama and so on.

I still remember that every late night when I was a kid, my father who loved Gothic horror movies would use VCR to put this weird image in the world. The experience of two hours per night has stimulated my teenage to Waner Herr. Zog (German Film Director), Yang Sfankmeer (Master Czech Animation), Holyz Frankton (director of American experimental film) and other film directors and images.

(Photo: Christian Brems)

Although I am a child who is not very calm, loves sports, participates in football, tennis teams, etc. in school, but in the eyes of others, I am the student who "paint well" A "road of art", obtained a bachelor's degree at the Central St. Martin College, and then went to the University of London to continue his master's degree in art.

In the last semester of graduate students, I remember that I got the first laptop in my life. As soon as I got my hand, I started watching videos and playing editing software. I think this is a thing that is almost close to instinct!

After graduating from undergraduate, I remember that I said to myself at the time that this may be the last chance and the last time I want to do what I want to do. During that time, my father died unfortunately. He left me some money, which was enough to make me live without worry. So I wanted to try some creations that no one was looking forward to.

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The cover of the book designed by Atkins's father

I grew up in a book full of books since I was a child. I love writing very much. I valued words very much, and it gradually became the first way in my creation. Many of my works have text first, and then there are images, and some works will adapt the video script into articles.

In a sense, I tried to let my image works have a structure like poetry, and transferred grammar and sentence patterns to my video. To be honest, I always think that I don't love art so much, but this is the only place I can start imagination. I can concentrate my thoughts together through such a space: video, writing, performance, music, animation ...

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Atekins and the founder of the oil tank art center Qiao Zhibing took a group photo

The solo exhibition at the Shanghai Oil Art Center this time was the first time I showed my work in Asia.

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"Refuse.exe", 2019

Entering the exhibition hall, the most central work is two huge square wooden boxes, and the front is projected by a video work. With each loud noise, a variety of objects fell from one space, a bed, two ladders, a pile of bricks, a kitten ... Then, the huge anchor fell down and fell down. Then there is an iron chain that smashed the bricks. In addition, there were a lot of "garbage" that were not related to each other, books, cartons, feathers and even piano.

They dropped from the wooden box on the second floor and accumulated in the two wooden boxes on the first floor, so you have to go downstairs or upstairs to see what happened.

This work is a software program written by a video game engine to run in real time in the background. The suffix of the ".exe" in the title also implied its executable attributes. The algorithm will automatically control the posture and state of each object, as well as the way to collide with things on the ground. Therefore, every time or even every second is brand new and cannot be copied. This is a duplicate eternal cycle.

I like to make computers simulate realistic things. What is simulated in this work is "gravity", so it will also rain and snow in this work, and something happening in real life. However, these very ordinary and bland phenomena often make people feel that there is some metaphor, so things continue to fall, which also implies a melancholy emotion. I will also imagine it as a drama, but the moment of dramaticization is very short, an object falls gorgeously, and then stops abruptly. Going down is the only direction. Gravity is the only motivation. One of the core themes is the list of strokes.

The back of the wooden box is empty. I want to express that even if the computer simulates things that happened in the real world, it is virtual.

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"How to Made", 2018, Digital Image

Another video is called "How to Made". In a separate small space, the small TV at the end is constantly playing the production process of the factories assembly line.

Outside of the retro old -fashioned DV shooting, there was a male voice explaining calmly that the text was from the first volume of "Remembrance to the Year of the Water", "In the Swan Home".

The video is full of 19 hours, and the audience may not be able to watch it several times at the scene, but even if you see the film, in fact, I have not revealed what it is producing. We generally think that the digital process of the computer or the things created by the computer are virtual and no real objects, but in fact, I want to express the support of the mechanical operation. There is a strong set of manufacturing flow lines. The materiality of digital products is also reminding us that it is not perfect and errors.

In addition, there are several embroidery works, all produced in Shanghai's local embroidery factories.

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"Embroidery Works", 2022

Among them, some of my own paintings, after being captured by action, scanned into abstract lines, and finally sewed on the cloth.

Two large embroidery works are displayed in the office area of ​​the oil tank art center, based on my father's diary and the tenth -century Japanese writer Qing Shaona's "annoying things".

Among these two works, the original literature has changed in the algorithm and was translated into Chinese. I hope these embroidery is not only straightforward, but also a jerky and rude literature that can highlight the dense handicraft process.

My father started writing a diary since he was 16 until he died of cancer. At home, we retained his stack of diary. I always wanted to publish it in some form to commemorate him, but I had to blur the specific content at the same time. So I used his text as a data input, which lost the reason after arranging in the order of letters, and finally appeared in the form of repeated and meaningless words.

If you read it carefully, you will see some of his vocabulary about your cancer, about depression and pain, you may always think about it for a moment, what is erased in the process of being data? What disappeared?

I really like that feeling -when the precise text meets some more relaxed, poetic media. However, vectorized text and mechanized embroidery will require technology to "fully" imitate the characteristics of human beings, but also experience deep failures in this process.

I came to the oil tank for the first time in 2019. At that time, there was no epidemic. I walked in the space transformed by 5 waste oil tanks and felt particularly surprised! At present, there is an urge to create here, because it is not a new space that starts from scratch, and my work is also the embezzlement and conversion of many things I love. Finally, let me create a work that can talk to it here.

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"OLD FOOD" fragment

I have a work called "OLD FOOD", which shows its fragment in the tank this time.

There was a piece of a little boy crying while playing the piano. Many people say that a sense of depression is seen in my work.

Its inspiration comes from the first science fiction "Science Weird" in Western literature. The protagonist Frankenstein monster is my first reference for artificial intelligence. It makes me feel very threatening -think of the decisions that happened in capital flow and power flow. Terrible. I don't even need to remember, and I don't need to know what time is now, because my mobile phone will know.

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Up: "Hisser", 2015

Bottom: "The Worm", 2021

All use dynamic capture technology

The characters in many of my works are used by my face to capture technology to embed my face and create a high simulation virtual person. These characters often cry, drink, talk to themselves in the film, and do "unknown". As far as me is concerned, using virtual characters to convey the true emotions of human beings, sometimes it will even have stronger effects.

Just like watching an animation, when you are interested in the characters inside, "emotion" is only a creature that only has a creature. After the digital medium is transformed, it reaches people's hearts again. This feeling is wonderful.

I think "melancholy" is a very interesting word. Compared to "lost" or "mourning", the emotion of "depression" comes from the feeling of losing some of you who you don't know if you don't know what you lose. So to some extent, I can't understand why my work brought this feeling because I don't know what I lost. But this does not stop the loss of loss.

I think that the audience will touch the crying virtual character. Perhaps because of as a human, you feel that you are thoroughly seen, and even a feeling of resentment and disgust. ▲

Atkins currently lives and creates in Copenhagen in Denmark

But when I first used this fresh language to create, I only knew that I was fascinated. And my work is precisely by trying to expose the limitations of machinery by striving for perfect technology, let everyone pay attention to people. Because life always exceeds the simulation capabilities of any computer, not only is it technical, but also in phenomena, emotion, and death.

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Atkins and writer Steven Zultansky

Co -creation and director's drama "Sorcerr" performance scene

In March of this year, the drama "Sorcerr" co -created by a writer and friends in Copenhagen was performed in Copenhagen. This is the first time that I tried drama creation. The idea of ​​this drama was born during the epidemic, and recorded the quiet, private, real and embarrassing daily life with friends.

This drama has reached an agreement with the most successful part I created -a break of real. The performance is camouflage, and the image is also a layer of camouflage. Whether in the drama or in the image, "the show" is what I deliberately pursued. It's like a laughing field, or a jumping needle of vinyl records, or a buffer to play video.

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Atkins draws a small painting in her daughter's lunch box every day,

Published a book, published in the form of children's reading this year

This summer, my wife and I ushered in the second little baby. Now I am spending a very busy time to take care of the two identities of my grandmother and creators. Every morning, I will draw a small painting in my daughter's lunch box, just like my father was looking at the most interesting animation in the world in the world in the middle of the night.

exhibition

Ed Atkins: useless things

Exhibition period

July 8, 2022-January 8, 2023

address

Oil can art center · Shanghai Longteng Avenue No. 2380

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