Blue and Red

Zhou Tao’s videos explore means to create a dialogue between moving images, addressing the inner workings of systems and topologies through careful study of specific events in manifold perspective.

Zhou Tao’s videos explore means to create a dialogue between moving images, addressing the inner workings of systems and topologies through careful study of specific events in manifold perspective. Often presented as multipart displays, Tao’s works comprise visuals and narrative materials that he encounters in his surroundings, reflecting his knowledge of living organisms, natural scenery and inorganic matter. Encompassing scenes from metal mines and villages in mountains and valleys to moments during recent anti-government protests, Blue and Red (2014) follows ‘digestive processes’, in which society can be seen slowly coming together, thus revealing the requisite elements for the formation of a political community. The video installation features a montage of scenes from various locations—including industrial zones in Shaoguan, China and a military coup in Bangkok—that chronicle modernity’s spatial multiplicity through embodied experience and a process occurring spontaneously and simultaneously in different parts of the world. This project was part of Sharjah Biennial 13.