Miss Nice-Looking

Chi-Yu Liao presents the viewer with five ordinary live situations in which she is the protagonist. She attempts to play table tennis and jump rope with two of her friends. With another friend she pretends to have a meal, feeding him ice cream while he takes a sausage out of a microwave. In yet another situation, the artist portrays the solitary activities of reading a book or blowing up a balloon while other actors intrude in on the act. Although the scenarios seem believable, the viewer very quickly senses their artificiality. The actors' gestures are too awkward and their poses seem to be even more out of place. A closer look reveals the source of the tension: the actors are blindfolded. They wear plastic masks with huge anime-like eyes painted on them.

Suddenly, pictures of daily life become powerful metaphors for constantly failing relationships. They demonstrate people's profound inability to see others and interact with them in a meaningful way. Every activity initiated by the actors halts at its very inception. Yet the actors smile nonchalantly and aloof, in spite of their incessant communicative fiascos. The artist emphasizes that we often live in a virtual reality of imagined relationships that we construct in our heads, lacking the courage to transgress the position of a blinded subject. (Olena Chervonik)