Dance! Dance! Bruce Ling!

2013

Performance video

12’

Yao Qingmei assumes the guise of a fictional persona ‘Bruce Ling’ holding a hammer and sickle in each hand. The performance progresses in a dance sequence amongst a painted bamboo scenery referencing kung fu, socialist era renditions, and ballet. This piece is a combination of performance art and minimalist spectacle. The action that smashes the pot along with the depletion of the body retains hallmarks of Body Art, whilst the scenery and distance to the audience appears adapted from theatre. The artist modulates Bruce Lee’s cry by way of an aria, whilst the pianist accompanies her action with a heavily romanticized rendition of Fury of the Dragon theme tune. The transformation of action culminates towards a paradoxical situation, Bruce Ling’s dance is in all seriousness, too seri-ous, her stiff body is awkward – the humor is further charged with the earnest artist trying ever so hard to embody a character transcending beyond the limits of the artist’s own natural aptitude.

 

Performers: YAO Qingmei and pianist Chen Junkai

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