Neighbors 鄰居

2019-2020
Video, single-channel, color, with sound
Video duration: 08’14’’

錄像和行為
錄像長度: 08’14’’

<Neighbors> is about my unusual relationship with my "neighbors" downstairs. My studio was in the Pfizer building in Brooklyn, New York. There were three holes through the floor in my studio; thus, I could see the space downstairs. They were here before I came into the studio. Because of these strange holes, I started a series of actions trying to interact with the space and people downstairs. This interaction is not through verbal communication, but through specific objects and actions to convey messages and information. For example, I sent candy through the hole to show my friendliness, used a periscope to see the space downstairs, recorded the sound and image of the space to understand its environment, let the people downstairs know me by sending my portrait, and gave them a cup of coffee since I saw them drinking coffee in the morning. I had a camera in my studio to record what was going on under the hole.

The word ”neighbor“ in this work refers to both people and space. My neighbors and I have never had a face-to-face direct conversation or contact; however, because of the strange architectural structure, the two groups of people (an art student and laborers, a foreigner and citizens, East Asian and Americans) who had no intersection in society were connected in a strange way. We break down the barriers of language, culture, ethnicity, and social identity to create an unusual but authentic relationship with purely human behavior.

2019 年，我在紐約的工作室位在一棟食品工業大樓Pfizer building的七樓，裡面有數間食品加工廚房和廠商。當我搬進工作室時，發現地板上有兩個拳頭大小的洞，它們貫穿地板的水泥結構，因此我可以透過這兩個洞看到樓下的空間。奇怪的洞引起我對樓下未知的一切感到好奇，於是開始一連串的觀察和行動，試圖了解樓下的空間和人。

我採取不同的方式探索樓下的空間環境，並藉由傳遞特定的物件間接地傳遞信息，和我的「鄰居」進行互動，例如:投送糖果以表示友好、傳送我的照片為了讓鄰居知道我的長相。幾個月後的某天，地板上突然出現第三個洞，然而，寒假過後，當我從台灣返回紐約的工作室，所有的洞都被填平了。

「鄰居」這個詞在作品中即是人也是空間。我和我的「鄰居」從未面對面地直接交談和接觸，卻因為奇怪的建築結構，將原本在社會上毫無交集的兩群人口，以奇異的方式連結起來，打破語言、文化、種族、社會身分的隔閡，以人類純粹的行

為，建立起一段異常卻真實的關係。