Cosmic Call
2019 - Drawing & Print (Drawing & Print)
12:43 minutes
Angela Su
In the first part of Cosmic Call by Angela Su the voiceover proposes in a neutral, documentary-like tone, a series of stories to rethink the way we usually understand, justify, or place blame for epidemiological events. Comets carrying an infective bacterium are linked with the invasion of viruses—our current nemeses—coming from outer space. Second-century BCE medicinal writings correlated the appearance of 29 comets over 300 years with events including plague and drought. Other ways of thinking about diseases than those delineated by Enlightenment frameworks of science and progress are highlighted. In the second part of the video, the near-immutability of outbreak narratives and the character’s frustration at her inability to significantly transform them, forces the main character –Su herself–to take matters into her own hands. She has nurses inject her body with doses of the deadly viruses to become one with them, living with them rather than othering them. The facts and fiction woven together in Cosmic Call create an alternative understanding of epidemiological outbreaks and points to the danger of reducing all knowledge to scientific terms, showing the extent to which our reactions to illness are framed by different levels of fiction. Assembled from a variety of historical and imaginary sources in what seems to be a documentary, the work indeed brings forward all sorts of accusations, conspirations, fears, affinities, identifications and illusions, which culminate in a transformative, gothic action involving deliberate exposure to a series of viruses. Relevant worldwide, Cosmic Call also addresses issues that are specifically pertinent to Hong Kong, which is characterised by conditions–its high population density and mobility–that make it extremely vulnerable to disease outbreaks.
Angela Su’s practice is derived from her two divergent backgrounds–she received a degree in biochemistry in Canada before pursuing visual arts. Known for her intricate scientific drawings where delicacy of technique is contrasted with ambiguous and sometimes unsettling content, Angela Su combines in her works the analytical approach of a scientist with a deep sensitivity toward the felt, visceral experience. She connects her ideas through her imaginative drawings to this blending of science and alchemy, and recognizes the mutability or change, in species, whether human animal or the insect variety. Interested in science-fiction, medicine, and advanced computational technologies, her works (drawings, video, hair embroidery and installation) focus on the interrelations between our state of being and scientific technology, and more recently her mental and physical illness and social control.
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