We, as artists, or more generally speaking, creative makers, are obsessed with ‘expressing ourselves’.
To dig out and express something from deep within the ‘self’, that psychological, emotional and sociopolitical space that (we think) we occupy, seems to be the whole point of creativity.

Regardless of this or that ‘ism’, regardless of religions and rituals, there are non-western modes of thinking according to which, the whole concept of the ‘self’ is a delusional construct of the ‘mind’, and at the root of lots of our suffering.

Is trying to make art by following the instructions of the analytical mind soothing and liberating, or does it lead to more anxieties and torment? And what if we go in the complete opposite direction by making art as an attempt to abandon the mind?

Ying Liu’s project, ‘Collective Contemplation’, tries to do that and in a collective way. A group of eight invited artists, including Liu herself, meet online and spend one hour together, in silence, each simply interacting with the material of their choice, without intending to make an artwork. The meeting repeats four times, and the artists change the material they work with for every new meeting.

This virtual being-together in the time of a pandemic adds another layer to the project. While we all have to do online meetings for work and try hard to hide our stress and tension, this project does the opposite:

No worries, no small talk, no performing, just be, together with us, and play with a material.ictioning Comfort.

Featuring works by

Adriaan Luteijn, Alireza Abbasy, Anastasia Shin, Eun Lee, Mike Megens, Ryan Lim Zi Yi and Sam Bachy