Mass Transit Railway: Sing Jantzen Tse Audio-visual Installation (at Current Plans 27 July to 27 September, 2024)

A deconstructed metro car structure, a composition of video screens, blinking handles, and metal benches, is set amidst an ambient soundscape of a train in motion. ‘Mass Transit Railway’ is a new installation by Sing Jantzen Tse that transforms mundane objects related to transportation, public streets, and recreational parks, employing a multi-screen and sound playback composite construction to evoke a feeling of sensory overload.

In a series of small screens overhead, Lana Tong: A Tailormade Tour (2024) shows a tourist guide who travels with us through the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong, from a public estate to a hectic shopping district. Her commentary is conveyed via deliberately low-fidelity speakers to emulate the sound quality of weathered public broadcast speakers. Passengers Back and Forth (2024) is displayed over six vertical screens, which feature passengers on a subway minding their own business. Seemingly banal, it represents a microcosm of everyday Hong Kong life, reenacted with detailed choreography by the artist who enlisted actors.

Overhead, four small screens loop videos that parody advertisements of luxury apartments and dance tutorials inspired by square dancing trends, a blend of humour and self-deprecation. Juxtaposing public and personal space; interior and exterior, the video installation explores the social aspects of image production and consumption in our daily lives. The soundscape, sourced from Hong Kong’s two longest MTR lines, loops a forty-minute track of train ambience through broadcast-style speakers, with vibrations transmitted to seats. This monotonous noise with the passengers’ performance operates as a time-dissolving machine. As audiences immerse themselves alongside the “Passengers” in perpetual waiting, they enact Goffman’s metaphor of “role distance”—suspended in the fissure between social discipline and self-performance, eternally awaiting a platform where masks may fall, journeying toward an unknowable destination.

Curator: Eunice Tsang

(Note: This is a video documentation of the artist’s exhibition, Mass Transit Railway.)

大小不一的電子屏幕、閃爍的扶手、金屬長凳，以及列車行駛中的熟悉聲景，擅於將不同事物拼湊的謝，將這個不斷浮現於腦海的港鐵車廂碎片，最終搬運至此。《地下鐵》作為謝振聲其中一件港味十足的裝置作品，其提取了與交通工具、公共街道及休憩公園相關的物件。透過多屏幕和長年累月收集的聲音複合解構的運用，喚起一種感官超載的沉浸式體驗。

由六個並排近乎平視的錄像屏幕上，短片《唐儷玲 : 隨你所想文化遊（2024）》呈現了一位導遊對繁華喧鬧的香港的介紹，與我們共同穿梭於熙熙攘攘的公共屋邨以及繁忙的購物區。她的解說由精心設計，置於頭頂的揚聲器傳遞，藉此模仿老舊公共廣播的磨損音質。同一組屏幕緊接播放另一件作品《去來往返程步禮們 (2024)》。在大型立式螢幕展示著在地鐵車廂各自忙碌的一系列乘客，乘客們被放大的舉動、定格的神情，建構出香港日常生活的縮影。前來探索車廂的觀眾（亦是乘客）觀賞著眼前被收錄的乘客們，如同卞之琳的《斷章》 “你站在橋上看風景，看風景的人在樓上看你”，賦予了詩意般互動，忙碌中的都市人，風景的主體意識到底從何而來。

在頭頂上方，小型錄像屏幕循環播放著效仿的樓盤廣告，以及受不同媒介潮流啟發的舞蹈教程視頻，充滿詼諧和自我批判。影像裝置將公共和私人空間、室內與室外空間並置，進一步探索了日常生活中的圖像和消費的社會層面。裝置聲景採集自港鐵兩條最長路線，四十分鐘的循環行駛音軌在廣播式喇叭播出，同時藉震動傳至座椅。這單調噪音與乘客表演成為消解真實的時間機器；而觀眾沉浸於此，伴隨「程步禮們」一直等待，恰是戈夫曼的「角色距離」（role distance） 隱喻——我們在社會規訓與自我表演的裂隙間，永恆等待著卸下面具的月台，前往一個不知所向的終點。

策展人: 曾智愛怡

（註：本作品為藝術家展覽《地下鐵》的紀錄片段。）

Sing Jantzen Tse received his Master of Fine Art at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Sing’s artworks focus on the topics of language and conversation, sound and visuals of daily objects and city landscapes. Delighted in reconstructing scenes using diverse materials to document and re-present various pure experiences, his artworks explore the inextricable and entangled relationships between people, time, the urban environment, and objects of daily life. Tse’s creative practice is primarily led by sound and video installations, as well as sound performances. Tse is active in varied kinds of music and multimedia theatre performances. He also engages in Artistic education. The latest solo exhibition is “Mass Transit Railway” (2024). Tse was supported by soundpocket’s Artist Support Programme 2011–12.