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 Mixed
media installation: metal fence whose links are bent into
word forms, live sheep.
This installation is a collaborative between Xu Bing and
the Eastern Illinois Art Department Students who were assisted
by members of the Art faculty. The installation's primary
feature is a "net" created by the students using aluminum
wire to create words. The words are mounted on sheets of
Plexiglas and the text consists of narratives written by
the students. The Net is intended to pose questions about
communication: the limits of language as a form of communication,
our ability to communicate verbally and non-verbally, the
role of art as communication, and the cultural connotations
of language and art. Sheep are incorporated into the installation
to raise issues of communication between species, dominance
and passivity, human rights versus animal rights. Persistent
thinking about human culture vs. animal culture (or the
lack thereof) has inspired the artist in all his work with
animals.
The Leash (1998)
 Mixed
media installation: metal leash whose links are bent into
word forms, live sheep.
This installation was created in the spirit of The Net.
Two live sheep are leashed with a link-metal leash that
forms the words to a John Berger poem. The Leash is intended
to pose questions about communication: the limits of language
as a form of communication, our ability to communicate verbally
and non-verbally, the role of art as communication, and
the cultural connotations of language and art. Sheep are
incorporated into the installation to raise issues of communication
between species, dominance and passivity, human rights versus
animal rights. Persistent thinking about human culture vs.
animal culture (or the lack thereof) has inspired the artist
in all his work with animals.
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