Magician Space

2021/3/2-4/17

798 Art: The everyday objects in the works as the main body of expression have a anthropomorphic sense of life. Are you highlighting the existence and individuality of the objects themselves?

Hu Jieming: I had this feeling when I first started shooting. For example, the first picture in this series was a sofa I sat on myself. A box of napkins and alcohol cotton used to wipe the phone was next to a red sofa. At that time, I drank tea and stood up and then looked back at the place where I sat. It felt like I was shooting something that had some meaning, but as the shooting progressed, this demand gradually faded. There were more and more subjective interventions, the general way was to do subtraction and lighten the quality. In fact, later on, I regarded these objects as elements of the picture. For example, the sofa is not a sofa, but a piece of color. The color of the back wall and the relationship between it is a color block, which is an abstract graphic concept.

798 Art: You refined and strengthened the colors in the post-processing of these photographic works, and named the works after the colors themselves. What are the considerations for this emphasis on colors?

Hu Jieming: I am more proficient in using late-stage software. It was like playing at first. In the process of color-grading the first work, I found that the effect of "popping" it was more suitable for expression. Normally, people would not deal with it easily. Just like when painting, I rarely use pure colors directly, but try to find a balanced restriction to deal with colors. The current color relationship processing is related to my mood at the time. Perhaps because of depression and boredom, I always feel a certain kind of strong feeling can not come out. By purifying the color, I feel that I have been released.

In addition, if I sum it up afterwards, the light also gave me this feeling. The visible light is converted into the perception of color on the retina. My purification method is to emphasize one of the hues and shield other hues, so that the color becomes simpler, and the intensity and personality increase.

798 Art: Compared with the rich use of media in your creations, the creation methods of the "The Things" series are obviously simpler and more direct, or, as you said, it presents a kind of "low-tech" characteristics that can  you specifically talk about the relevant thinking behind this choice?

Hu Jieming: A direct cause during the epidemic was that complex creation could not be carried out, and the circumstances at the time did not allow me to go out of the house often. Subjectively speaking, I have always had an unsolvable puzzle over the years. The cost of doing new media art has become higher and higher, and the various elements involved have become more and more complicated. The more complex it is, it seems to enter a strange circle, and a reasonable solution must be found. How to subtract in creation has always been a proposition I am considering. The shooting of the "The Things" series during the epidemic has made this long-standing idea possible. The purification of colors can not only reduce the load but also bring strength. I can see the expressions used in the creation of the "The Things" series. The possibility of "doing subtraction", I believe this method is also suitable for the creation of installation images and digital interactive media, which also strengthens my confidence in continuing to try in this regard.

Text：Wang Wei