CUI YUXUAN
Documentary Photography, Place, Journey
Space, Narrative, Installation
Info/Bio
Instagram©2024 Cui Yuxuan
2024
( In collaboration with Yu Dayu, Xianfang Zeng, Chu Chu, Huaiqian Liu, Yanxun Zhou)
Video installation, clay, fiber materials, wire mesh, steel hoops, iron frames
JiaKong is a fictional ethnographic project—a nonlinear experiment in speculative mythologies and sensorial archaeology. We use fiction not to escape reality, but to pierce it—to approach fragmented experiences that institutional languages fail to hold: the survival techniques of marginalized groups, unrecognized knowledge systems, or cracks in collective memory. The JiaKong people do not belong to any territory or ethnic category; they emerge and vanish like ecological spirits inhabiting different geographies and bodies. Their language is made of images, fiber, myths, and soil. The body is not merely a symbol, but a vessel of continuity, rupture, and repair.
Through image-making, installation, performance, sound, and archival fragments, we construct their cosmologies of life, their rituals of death and rebirth, and their techniques of survival. Rather than telling a closed narrative, this project invites other bodies, perspectives, and epistemologies into a shifting ritual space. Multiple artists co-construct JiaKong’s material and spiritual heritage in nonlinear ways. It is both collective fiction and a cross-species, cross-cultural practice of embodied repair.
JiaKong 是一个虚构民族建构项目。我们将虚构作为对现实的穿刺，用它去抵达那些制度无法收容的经验碎片——它们可能来自边缘群体的生存智慧、未被承认的知识系统、或集体记忆中的裂痕。JiaKong 社群没有国界，也不被现代身份学分类所囊括。它更像一个生态灵体，在不同地理与身体中生长，时隐时现。它的语言由图像、传说、纤维与泥土构成，身体是传承与修复的核心器官。这个项目并非讲述一个封闭神话，而是邀请不同的身体、身份与知识系统进入对话。多位艺术家共同参与，以非线性方式构建JiaKong的精神遗产与物质宇宙。它既是一次集体创作，也是一种跨物种、跨文化的感知修复实践。
A people known as the JiaKong believe that the universe is composed of countless interwoven fibers, which are both the foundation of the material world and bearers of mysterious powers.
一个被称为JiaKong的民族。Ta们相信宇宙是由无数交错的纤维构成，这些纤维既是物质世界的基础，也承载着神秘力量。
The JiaKongda are beings born from the hair of the Earth Goddess, endowed with the ability to weave life.
JiaKongda是从大地女神的头发中诞生的生灵，拥有编织生命的能力。
Legend has it that, when time and space were not yet distinct, the JiaKongda created a frog named BaXia.
传说，在时间与空间还未分明时，JiaKongda创造了一只青蛙——BaXia。
BaXia not only possesses the breath of life but is also entrusted with the responsibility of regulating the balance between death and reproduction. BaXia不仅拥有生命之息，更被赋予调节死亡与生殖平衡的责任。
As an embodiment of dual powers, the frog symbolizes the changes and cycles of life within the tribe, the endings and beginnings, the fading away and the birth.
作为两极权力的化身，青蛙成了族内生命变化与循环、结束与开始、消逝与诞生象征。
BaXia resides in a sacred place called the "Flower of Chaos," where strands woven from starlight and moonlight float on the water's surface.
BaXia住在名为“混沌花”的圣地里，在那里水面上飘荡着来自星辰和月光编制而成的丝线。
Every night, BaXia uses its tongue to capture these shimmering strands, spitting them out to form new life or retracting them to reclaim the fibers of old souls.
每当夜幕降临时, BaXia便会用舌头捕捉这些闪烁光线，并将其吐出形成新生命或收回旧日灵魂所属之纤维。
However, as time passed, the JiaKong people grew fearful of death and sought to escape it. They began to overpopulate in a bid for immortality.
然而随着时间流转, JiaKong族人对于死亡感到恐惧并试图逃避它, 他们开始过度繁衍以求永存.
This behavior disrupted the previously balanced and stable ecosystem. The roots and stems of the Flower of Chaos penetrated the once flawless fibrous membrane.
这种行为打乱了原本平衡稳定的生态系统. 混沌花的根茎渗入了曾经完美无缺的纤维皮膜内部.
JiaKongda must mend the fine web anew. She bites through her own navel, releasing red mud.
JiaKongda必须重新修补细网，她咬破自己的肚脐，流出红色泥浆。
Preparing to create anew for the JiaKong people...
准备为JiaKong族做再一次新的创生···
Installation/Performance View