Lin JingJing 林菁菁
Life as A Rumor 1500 x 300cm large size Video 2025
Life As A Rumor
is a 15-meter-wide panoramic video installation that investigates the fluidity of identity, the uncertainty of truth, and the ways in which reality is continuously constructed and reconstructed between certainty and ambiguity in the digital age.
Lies, rumors, memories, histories, and identities are woven into a shifting narrative field, where human perception itself, including collective imagination and social consensus, emerges as the least reliable narrator. The work approaches rumor as a generative mechanism of reality: it may depart from factual truth, yet ultimately come to shape what is accepted as reality. In doing so, it reveals not only the instability of reality itself, but also the inherent fragility of identity as a social and cultural construct.
《生活在谣言》
是一件长达15米的宽银幕影像作品,探讨身份的流动性、真相的不确定性,以及数字时代,现实在确定性与模糊性之间不断建构和重塑的过程。谎言、谣言、记忆、历史与身份彼此交织,包括集体想象、社会共识在内的人类的感知本身,成为最不可靠的叙述者。谣言被视为一种现实生成机制:它既可能偏离事实,也可能最终塑造事实;既揭示现实的不稳定性,也暴露身份建构本身的脆弱性。
Everything is Unreal Until It’s Not consists of a series of videos, works on canvas, and a piercing semi-organic installation. Through a stark contrast between idyllic and unsettling imagery, the work initiates a dialogue on the comforts and catastrophes of the technological era. The presented artworks not only speculate on the authenticity of a virtual mirage, but also allude to the intricate illusions of reality. As the title suggests, everything is unreal until it is not.
Lov-Lov is a fictitious artist identity developed by Lin Jingjing, as an unrestricted amorphous vessel of artistic creation. Inspired by the versatility and fluidity of artificial intelligence, Lov-Lov is a self-defined entity free of physical indicators and binary definitions such as age, gender, and ethnicity. Lov-Lov aims to be a mimesis of consciousness. Adopting the transhumanist capabilities enabled by contemporary technology, it seeks to peek behind the veil of empirical reality.
In the Critique of Pure Reason (1781), German philosopher Immanuel Kant proposed the doctrine of “transcendental idealism,” which suggests that all perceptions of objects and reality are not of the subjects themselves, but only the way they appear to us under the influence of our sensibilities. In other words, reality is but a phenomenon authenticated by subjective feeling. However, this notion has grown far more complex in the contemporary era. With the pervasive influence of technology, every aspect of living is rendered sweeter, brighter, and more palatable. Everyone and everything appear more beautiful when experienced through carefully manipulated systems designed to please, comfort, and persuade. Lov-Lov asks: Is this the new reality? Is this what humanity, as a collective, has tacitly subscribed to believe?
Lov-Lov’s video works present a world shaped by these conditions. Within the videos, humanoids with flawless features and perfectly symmetrical faces appear one after another in continuous montage. Less than sixty seconds a pop, adhering to today’s rule of thumb for consuming media, each clip comprises an ambiguous sermon, preaching a vaguely familiar truth. The faces, toying with the effect of the “Uncanny Valley,” are hauntingly seductive yet inexplicably alarming.
The imagery of each video was crafted using contemporary software and AI, while the scripts were composed by mimicking AI generative methods through a blend of varied existing materials. Targeting human irrationality and emotion, the texts are guided by rhetoric, unfolding almost like love songs. Equivocal yet evocative, the videos are reminiscent of artificial sweeteners. Lov-Lov raises another question: If the taste is sweet, do we still need to care about the ingredients? In a world saturated with illusion, if an empirical narrative is convincing, does rational discourse still retain any significance?
An extension of the video works, Lov-Lov’s paintings portray familiar yet dreamlike artificial environments. Between strangely scaled architecture and polyhedral trees, solitary figures wander casually as if digital avatars navigating a virtual landscape. Offering an alternative landscape to real life, the artworks speak to the evolving tendency toward technological escapism, where virtual worlds have become not only temporary refuges, but immersive oases increasingly embraced as part of reality itself. From personal devices to urban landscapes, there is seemingly a simulated reality masked over everyday life, a candy-coating that thickens with every digitally enhanced image and every carefully calculated stream of information. Yet when desires for control are repackaged as comforting promises, when fears of the unknown are distracted by illusion, and when the blue pill of hope and indulgence remains within reach, why would we not willingly accept it? After all, everything is unreal until our will accepts it as real.
However, certain historical events inevitably arrive to shatter the mirages in which we place our faith. Lov-Lov’s installation responds to the consequences of prolonged life within illusion. In sharp contrast to the videos and paintings, the installation artwork Everything is Unreal Until It’s Not (2024) presents a mirror quietly positioned at the center of the space. Suspended above it are thorn-covered vines that appear to grow from knife handles, extending outward like a spreading nightmare.
As if a scene from a classic fairytale, the installation conveys a certain banality in its representation of harm and hostility, reflecting our disbelief in the possibility of total catastrophe. In an age where idealism is continually reaffirmed, traumatic events such as war and large-scale disease often register as fiction within our subconscious minds. As catastrophe occurs, we observe from a distance through filtered information, allowing the illusion to remain intact. Only when misfortune occupies and replaces the screens through which we view reality, forcing direct confrontation with adversity, do we finally see—and exclaim:
“Wow, this doesn’t feel real.”
《一切都是幻觉,直到成为现实》
(Everything is Unreal Until It's Not)
包含一系列录像,布面作品以及一件尖锐刺骨的半有机装置。艺术家透过田园诗般和令人不安的意象两者间鲜明的对比展开对话,探究科技时代带来的舒适与灾难,不仅揣测了虚拟幻像的真实性,同时暗指现实中错综复杂的假象,正所谓:一切皆是幻觉,直至它们成为现实。
Lov-Lov 是一个由林菁菁建构不受限制的艺术家身份,以作为创作的非定形容器。受人工智慧的多变性和流动性所启发, Lov-Lov 是一个自我定义的实体,免除了物理指标和年龄,性别,种族等二元定义。 Lov-Lov 旨在成为意识的摹仿,它选择了当代科技所带来的超人类能力,借此窥探藏匿于经验主义面纱背后的现实。
德国哲学家伊曼努尔. 康德在《纯粹理性批判》(1781 年)中提出了「先验唯心主义」学说,认为对物体和现实的所有感知都不是主体本身,而只是它们在我们感性的 影响下呈现在我们面前的方式。 换 句话说,所谓现实不过是被主观感觉所证实的现象。 然而,此一概念于当代变得更为复杂。 在科技大 量渗透的推波助澜之下,生活的各个层面都被粉饰得更甜蜜,更明亮,更可口。 当我们透过这种精心操纵以取悦、安慰和打动而造就的体验时,每个人和每件事都会显得更加美妙动人。 —Lov-Lov 赘问, 这是新的现实吗? 这是人类作为一个集体所默许信奉的吗?
Lov-Lov 的布面和录影作品设想了一个体现上述理念的世界呈现在观众眼前。 录影作品中, 一个个有着完美五官、精确对称脸孔的类人类(Humanoid)蒙太奇式的接二连三地出现。 秉持了当今媒体消费的经验法则,每条录影带以不到 60 秒时间,呈现一段模棱两可的训示,宣扬似曾熟悉的真理。 这些脸孔把弄着「恐怖谷」的效果,使人心驰神往,却又莫名惊恐。
录影作品中的影像都使用了当代智慧软体和人工智慧制作而成,旁白脚本则模仿了人工智慧的生产方法, 融合各种现成素材混合而成。 其文字指向人的非理性情感,透过修辞的牵引撰写出一首犹如情歌般作 品。 这些影片让人联想到人造甜味剂,味道不明却叫人成迷不已,Lov-Lov 在此进而质问:「只要味道甘甜,我们还需在乎成份吗?」。 若然在这虚幻充斥的世界中,如果经验主义的叙事令人信服,理性的话语是否仍具备任何意义?
作为录影作品的延伸,Lov-Lov 的布上作品描绘了一个既梦幻又宁静的常见人工场境。 其中,孤独的人物漫不经心地游荡于比例奇特的建筑和棱角多面的树木之间,仿佛电子游戏中玩家的数位化身。 作品不仅提供了现实以外的另类景观,更反映了迅速发展的科技所蕴含逃避现实之趋向,在这大趋势下,虚拟世界已不仅仅是人们临时的避风港,更被视为现实生活一部分,使人身临其境的绿洲。 从个人装置仍至城市景观,我们所处的生活仿似被模拟现实全然覆盖,每滑过一张经过数码美化的图像或大数据下精密计算的资讯,都让这层糖衣变得更加厚重 。
然而,当自身对控制的欲求不满被包装成甘言蜜语、 对未知的恐惧得以被各种幻像分散、许诺希望和放纵的蓝色药丸就在眼前,我们何不心甘情愿地接受? 毕竟,一切皆是 虚幻,直至我们的意志接受它成为真实。
然而,当人类为了心理上的愉悦而摒弃血肉之躯,亦必定会迎来某些重大的历史性事件将我们当头棒喝,粉碎信以为真的海市蜃楼。Lov-Lov在展览中的一件装置作品,便回应了长期生活于幻像中的后果。 与录影和布面作品形成鲜明对比的,是与展览同名的装置作品《一切都是幻觉,直到成为现实》(2024 年)。
一面镜子安静地座落于展场的正中央,上空悬挂着仿似从刀柄上生长出来的带刺的藤蔓,就像一场蔓延扩展的恶梦伸向空间的顶端。 装置如同经典童话故事中的场景般,其表现伤害和敌意的形式同时展现出某种迂腐,反映我们对可能出现的彻底灾难感到难以置信。 在理想主义被不断重申的今天,战争和大规模疾病等创伤于我们的潜意识中如同虚构。
当灾难发生时,我们往往只从远处观察、接受被过滤的资讯,好让幻象得以维持。 只有当厄运真正占领并取代我们那直视着的萤幕,迫使与不幸对峙的瞬间,我们才会终于看到,而惊呼:「哇,这太不真实了」。
We are Free to Choose but We Are not Free From the Consequences of Our Choices: Departures
200 x 250cm LED display panel
We are Free to Choose but We Are not Free From the Consequences of Our Choices: Arrivals
200 x 250cm LED display panel
LED display panels as make part of the Take Off project, simulating Arrival and Departure boards. The brightly colored flight information on the screens scrolls according to the current time at the site of the installation.
LED显示屏作为“Take Off”项目的一部分,模拟到达和出发信
息牌。屏幕上鲜艳的航班信息会根据安装地点的当前时间滚动显示。
Lin Jingjing employs experimental practices to conduct conceptual tests and visual interpretations. Her works often infuse absurd imagination and humor, juxtaposing contradictions to reflect and challenge unresolved issues. She deeply engages with themes of personal politics, absence, gender, death, philosophy, power dynamics, and the nature of trauma.
Through her interdisciplinary practice, she uses objects, language, images, and theatrical elements to explore human relationships as interdependent existences—examining roles and responsibilities within these dynamics. Her artistic works span installation, video, sound, animation, light, performance, sculpture, painting, drawing, coding, mixed media, and photography.
林菁菁运用实验性实践,进行观念上的测试和视觉的演绎实验。她常常在作品中注入荒谬的想象和幽默,将 矛盾并置,以折射和挑战未解决的问题,她思考并深入探讨了个人政治、缺席、性别、死亡、 哲学、权力动态和创伤的本质。通过她的跨学科实践,她利用物体、语言、图像和戏剧,来探讨人与人之间作为相互依存的存在,角色和责任。她的艺术作 品涵盖了装置、视频、声音、动画、光、表演、雕塑、绘画、绘画、编码、混合媒体和摄影。
Username or Password Incorrect Installation 2017
Part of Take Off is an installation of 50 marble passports, representing 50 countries. The text and images from the covers of those countries’ real passports is faithfully engraved onto the marble. The pieces are the size of the originals, but much thicker.
Passports are intended to prove the legitimacy, recognition, and traceability of one's identity; they signify friendliness and establish that the holder is not a threat, allowing them to enter other countries.
“Take Off”项目的一部分是一个由50个大理石护照组成的装置,代表着50个国家。这些国家真实护照封面的文本和图像被忠实地雕刻在大理石上。这些大理石片的尺寸与护照原件相同,但厚度厚了许多。
护照旨在证明个人身份的合法性、承认性和可追溯性;它们象征着友好,并表明持有人不构成威胁,从而允许他们进入其他国家。
The Quick and Easy Way Installation 2017
The ongoing presence of violence, continuously employed as a quick and simple means of problem-solving, is disconcerting and disheartening. It represents a profound regression in our collective human nature and civilization.
This work invites reflection and transcending any primal instincts that drive us to resort to violence, calling for the collective wisdom of peace and understanding.
暴力的持续存在, 持续被作为一种快速简单的解决问题的手段是令人不安和沮丧的,它是我们集体人性和文明的深刻倒退。
该作品邀请反思并超越任何驱使我们动用暴力的原始本能,呼吁和平和理解的集体智慧。
One Hundred Percent Installation 2015
One Hundred Percent is an installation artwork that extensively utilizes clothing tags produced en masse in factories as a unique material.
By magnifying it, the artwork boldly proclaims that fantasy is a promise and advertising associated with mass production, offering feedback that in the realm of material consumption, it's not just about the products themselves but also about imagination and emotion.
The inspiration behind this installation artwork stems from witnessing the frantic pursuit of fast consumption and large-scale production in modern society, as well as people's excessive reliance on materialism. By enlarging what is typically an overlooked small item - clothing tags - into a colossal installation, the artwork seeks to convey a powerful message:
we live in a world dominated by labels, packaging, and mass manufacturing, where these tags were once promises of dreams and fantasies.The name of this installation artwork, "one hundred percent," signifies a commitment of the highest purity, but it also carries a hint of irony, questioning whether this commitment is truly worthy of our trust.
The artwork prompts viewers to reflect on their roles in the material world, the satisfaction they derive, and their relationship with reality.
百分之百
大量使用了工厂批量生产的服装标签作为别致的材料,放大地宣告了幻想作为批量生产的承诺和宣传,来反馈物质世界消费的不仅仅是商品本身,同时还有想象力和情感。
这个装置作品的灵感来源于目睹现代社会对于快速消费和大规模生产的疯狂追逐,以及人们对于物质主义的过度依赖。通过将衣物标签这一通常被忽视的小物件放大成巨大的装置,作品试图传达出一种强烈的讯
息:
我们生活在一个被标签、被包装、被大规模制造的世界中,这些标签一度是对梦想和幻想的承诺。这个装置作品的题目:百分之百意味着一种百分之百的最高纯度
的承诺,隐含着一种讽刺,询问该承诺是否真的值得我们的信任?
作品让观众反思自己在物质世界中的角色,满足感和以及我们和现实的关系。
This is Beginning of My Desperation Installation 2017
This installation consists of twelve vibrant, transparent, hollow acrylic glass boxes arranged in a row, forming a rainbow-like spectrum of colors.
The text on the boxes, including book titles, authors, publishing houses, and a line of simple yet resolute promotional phrases, is sourced from twelve top-selling self-help books. These books instruct individuals on how to swiftly attain happiness and joy. The sales figures of these books are remarkable, but even more remarkable is the depth of helplessness hidden behind the intense yearning.
这件装置作品由十二个色彩鲜艳、透明、空心的丙烯酸玻璃箱组成,它们排成一排形成了彩虹般的色彩。
箱子上的文字,包括书名、作者、出版社,以及一行简单坚定的宣传句,来自12 本真实出版的排名前列的畅销书,教导人们如何迅速地获得快乐和幸福,这些书籍的销量是惊人的,更惊人的是在强烈的渴望背后,有多少深切无助的人们。
Whatever Survives Installation 2017
Fall in Love A Million Times 300 x 200 cm 2019
Project Lov-Lov marks a shift from the dystopian to the utopian.
In the world of Lov-Lov, every form of perfection is possible—and commercially available.
One component of the project is a fictional pharmacy that showcases a series of mind-altering medications designed to deliver perfect emotional satisfaction. Customers can purchase and rapidly experience feelings they deeply desire yet often struggle to attain: love, respect, care, friendship, trust, gratitude, intimacy, and a sense of belonging.
Through these individualized emotional shortcuts, Lov-Lov proposes a form of large-scale social engineering, offering manufactured solutions to fundamental human needs and desires.
跨学科项目“Lov-Lov”从反乌托邦变成了乌托邦。在Lov-Lov的世界里,每一种完美都是可能的,并且都可以商业化。
虚构的药店是“Lov-lov”项目的一部分,展示着可以提供完美满足的药物,让顾客能够购买并迅速体验到他们内心深处渴望但难以实现的感受:爱、尊重、关心、友谊、信任、感激、亲密和归属感。
Lov-Lov通过个性化的捷径进行大规模社会工程。
No One Puts Their Children in A Boat Unless the Water is Safer than the Land 300c200cm, 2019
The title of this work is drawn from a line by poet Warsan Shire:
“No one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land.”
The installation consists of a long wooden beam, concrete blocks, and numerous acrylic elements. A single centrally positioned concrete block supports the entire beam, creating a fragile and highly unstable condition. Any slight movement may disrupt the balance, causing the acrylic elements resting on the beam to slide or fall. Through a minimal physical arrangement, the work transforms suspended risk into a reality that can be directly perceived.
The work reveals a harsh reality: migration does not always lead toward hope; more often, it begins with desperation.
Migration is often understood as a voluntary choice. For refugees, however, leaving is a difficult decision made between a worsening reality and an unknown future. When home can no longer provide safety, displacement becomes a condition of survival; when staying means danger, leaving becomes the only possibility.
Continuing Lin’s long-standing concern with identity, belonging, and the conditions of human existence, this work extends individual experience into the global reality of migration. It reflects on a situation in which, when belonging is lost and the familiar world collapses, migration occurs not because the destination is full of hope, but because there is no longer any way back.
标题取自诗人 Warsan Shire 的诗句:“没有人会把自己的孩子放上一艘船,除非海水比陆地更安全。” 装置由绵长的条木、水泥砖块与数量众多的亚克力构成。仅有的居中的砖块支撑着整块木条,造就脆弱而及其不稳定的状态。任何细微的移动都可能导致结构失衡,使木头上的亚克力滑落或坠毁。作品以一种极简的物理关系,将悬而未决的风险转化为可被感知的现实。 作品揭示一种残酷现实:迁徙并不总是通向希望,而往往始于绝望。 迁徙通常可以被理解为主动的选择,但对于难民而言,离开是在更坏的现实与未知的未来之间作出的艰难决定。当家园无法再提供安全,漂泊反而成为生存的条件;当留下意味着危险,离开便成为唯一的可能。 延续林对于身份、归属与存在处境的关注,这件作品将个体经验扩展至全球性的迁徙现实。它所讨论的是人在失去归属,熟悉的世界崩塌时,迁徙并非因为远方充满希望,而是因为身后已经没有退路。
Interdisciplinary Project