What Is Your Name?
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2020
Size: H 5' W 3' L 3'
Material: aluminum, steel, ink and acrylic on paper
I collaborated with Korean artist Haksul Lee for this socially engaging art project "What Is Your Name?", made possible by the ArtPort residency program at the Marine Air Terminal, LaGuardia Airport, by Queens Council on the Arts and the Port Authority of NY & NJ. The project was selected to be in The Immigrant Artist Biennial virtual exhibition "Mother Tongue", and it is a permanent collection of the Port Authority of NY & NJ.
We interviewed visitors in the airport, and various public spaces such as Queens Public Library at Flushing, to collect their names in their own language, in their own handwriting, in their own voices. Visitors freely personalized in colors and styles as they wish under one condition; the signature to represent who they are, where they are from.
The collected written names display a variety of colors and languages and placed on the white side of sculpture. We transcribed all the names into the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) and wrote them on the blue side with a single color. IPA is used to determine the pronunciation of any spoken language: Therefore, for anyone who studies a foreign language, IPA plays a critical role. IPA is a symbol of the universal use of language, and the only common ground of all the languages.
Along with the sculpture, the recorded names in one's own voice in one's mother language will be played from a small speaker quietly. The voices describe their various attitudes toward the action of introducing their names to strangers. Recording and talking about the names symbolically bring significant attention to the individuals that are essential elements in the society, but could otherwise have been considered unremarkable.
Size: H 5' W 3' L 3'
Material: aluminum, steel, ink and acrylic on paper
I collaborated with Korean artist Haksul Lee for this socially engaging art project "What Is Your Name?", made possible by the ArtPort residency program at the Marine Air Terminal, LaGuardia Airport, by Queens Council on the Arts and the Port Authority of NY & NJ. The project was selected to be in The Immigrant Artist Biennial virtual exhibition "Mother Tongue", and it is a permanent collection of the Port Authority of NY & NJ.
We interviewed visitors in the airport, and various public spaces such as Queens Public Library at Flushing, to collect their names in their own language, in their own handwriting, in their own voices. Visitors freely personalized in colors and styles as they wish under one condition; the signature to represent who they are, where they are from.
The collected written names display a variety of colors and languages and placed on the white side of sculpture. We transcribed all the names into the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) and wrote them on the blue side with a single color. IPA is used to determine the pronunciation of any spoken language: Therefore, for anyone who studies a foreign language, IPA plays a critical role. IPA is a symbol of the universal use of language, and the only common ground of all the languages.
Along with the sculpture, the recorded names in one's own voice in one's mother language will be played from a small speaker quietly. The voices describe their various attitudes toward the action of introducing their names to strangers. Recording and talking about the names symbolically bring significant attention to the individuals that are essential elements in the society, but could otherwise have been considered unremarkable.