Measurement Series, 2004-2019

“The Gravity, Sincerity, and Skepticism in the Insignificant”

The origin of my artistic practice—and much of its content—can be traced back to diabetes. For over thirty years, I have lived with the need to constantly monitor my blood, record data, and administer injections. For me, measurement is a means of survival; recording is a way to examine and assess the condition of my existence. It is through these acts that I remain conscious and awake in the present moment—able to choose, to decide what I must do next.

Before I studied art, measurement served only a practical function. It was passive, compulsory, and imposed—something I simply had to do. Though I have yet to resolve certain confusions and difficulties in my life, conceptual art gave me something else: a chance to reclaim meaning and value in what once felt futile. It allowed me to turn necessity into reflection, and to elevate both language and spirit—form and content—through deliberate practice.

Early measurement works, such as The Four Preliminary Practices Lifelong Project, are solemn and weighty. Many unfold over years or even a lifetime. But in more recent works, I’ve shifted tone. These later pieces are lighter, more humorous, more lyrical. This was a change I deliberately pursued.

I hope for the work to hold contradiction and disproportion at once: to treat the insignificant with gravity, and the serious with lightness; to scale up the trivial and scale down the monumental; to be earnest yet questioning, critical yet generous, gentle yet sharp.

〈微不足道的凝重、認真與質疑〉

我從事藝術工作的起因，乃至創作的內容，多數根源於糖尿病。因為這個疾病，三十年來我必須持續地驗血、紀錄、注射。對我而言，測量是活下去的必要手段，紀錄是審視、評估存在狀態的方式，然後保持清醒地活過「現在」，此時此刻，然後選擇、決定下一刻我該做什麼。

在我沒有學藝術之前，我的測量只有現實的功能，它是被動、強迫、不得不然的行為，雖然至今我仍然沒能解決我生命中的一些困境與困惑；然而觀念藝術讓我在無奈的生活與無意義的生命中，找到讓自己賦予自己生命意義與價值的機會，找到在語言上與精神上（形式與內容）鍛鍊提升的可能。有別於前述關於測量與記錄的作品，如《四前行終生計劃》，多數比較嚴肅、沈重，是要經年累月，甚至為期一生的計劃；後期的測量作品則比較輕鬆、幽默、抒情，這是我想做的改變。我希望作品能同時含括矛盾與不成比例的特質：小題大作、大題小作、將凝重的做得輕盈、把微不足道的做得認真、批判中帶有包容、輕鬆裡帶著質疑。