PUNCH 敲 (WIP)

In PUNCH 敲, Bu delves deeper into the performative rhythms embedded in her daily life, where post-objects act as subtle traces of living, creating, and the passage of time. This immersive installation, comprising film, performance video, video essay, sculptures and publicly engaged live actions, unfolds as an intimate chronicle of time, told through the physical and sonic act of punching.

Here, words become relics: imprints of time hammered directly onto aluminium, a material chosen for its memory, its cold sharpness and its loud, unfiltered voice. Punching becomes Bu’s new form of journaling: raw, immediate, and honest, a self-dialogue that transcends the confines of spoken language.

This exhibition is an invitation to engage with the phenomenology of material, to think through metal, to communicate through sound, mark and wound. It is performance entwined with everyday life, a surrender to the desire to be heard and understood without translation. Sculptures, video, sound and participatory performance converge into a living dialogue between artist, material and audience.

Through the repetitive, forceful act of punching, Bu reclaims the primal energy of mark-making, evoking early human expressions, a monkey’s urge to create sound. In doing so, she interrogates the dual nature of language, its power, its violence, its capacity to wound while proposing the possibility of healing through transformation: word into action, mark into presence, sound into connection. Sound becomes language, elemental, embodied, and immediate.

Now, what remains visible are the relics of those sounds, echoes imprinted in metal, traces of a voice that once struck the air.

在艺术家卜经纬的沉浸式装置艺术展览《PUNCH 敲》中，她以将字母敲打进铝板为日记，将语言化为声音与痕迹，记录日常、时间与身份的流动。展览融合影像、雕塑和公众参与的行为艺术表演，探索材料的现象学与语言的暴力与疗愈。敲打这个动作成为原始表达的回归，是一种无需翻译的自我对话。展览馆中的所见，正是那些敲打声音的遗迹——经由空气击打的痕迹，印入金属的回响。

Creative team:

Adam Richie: Sound scape for film

Ying He: Film editing assistant

Lindy Lee Art Studio: performance assistant for The Ground Is The Way and Video essay The Layman’s Bell

Nicholas Ullmann: sculpture stand fabrication

Jazmine Deng: catalogue essay writer

Lindy Lee: mentor

Supported by Creative Australia and Arts South Australia and curated by Andrew Purvis, PUNCHING will be exhibited at the Central Gallery from 3 June to 11 July 2025.

Photo by Hailun Wang