ONE MILLION (Japanese Yen)

2012 - Film & Video (Film & Video)

Kwan Sheung Chi


Kwan Sheung Chi’s work One Million is a video work depicting the counting of bills. Divided into three versions, the video first shows a number of Japanese ten-thousand-yen bills being counted without in an orderly, efficient manner. In Two Million , a similar counting of one-thousand-dollar bills from Hong Kong follows. However, a closer viewing of the videos reveal that they were created by looping the same scene of moving fingers, giving the illusion that many bills are being counted when, in fact, only a few are in the scene. Beyond commenting on the illusions of transactions and interdependencies in a regional economy, the video calls attention to the way media distort quantity as well as manipulations of values occurring with the transcoding of economic units into visual data. The false appearance of accountability presented in One Million and Two Million highlight the instability underlying the desire for convenience and efficiency in a globalized, media-dependent economy.


Kwan Sheung Chi obtained a third honor B.A. degree in Fine Art from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. In 2003, Kwan manufactured an exhibition history and CV for himself, hosting a retrospective as his first solo show towards the end of art school in order to critique the unspoken conventions of the contemporary art system. In general, Kwan’s works explore the nexus between art and text and use repetition as a constant measure of time and a metaphor for life, as he states: “Repetition gives the work power.” He is especially interested in how meaning is constructed, who makes art, and its interactions with other people, places, and things as part of the work’s cultural context.


Colors:



Related works featuring themes of: » Assemblage, » China, » Collective History, » Contemporary Conceptualism

Lift with care
© » KADIST

Hu Yun

2013

This research-based artwork acts as a memorial to early twentieth century European exploration of China...

New Town Ghost
© » KADIST

Minouk Lim

2005

New Town Ghost (2005) is one of Lim’s trio of large-scale video installations...

Exquisite Eco Living (executive Properties series)
© » KADIST

Vincent Leong

2012

The photograph Exquisite Eco Living is part of a larger series titled Executive Properties in which he digitally manipulated the images to insert iconic buildings of Kuala Lumpur in the view of derelict spaces also found in the city...

Cityscapes 1 (boats), 2 (woods)
© » KADIST

Hamra Abbas

2010

At first glance, Cityscapes (2010) seems to be a collection of panoramic photographs of the city of Istanbul—the kind that are found on postcards in souvenir shops...

21 Ke (21 Grams)
© » KADIST

Sun Xun

2010

Sun’s animated film 21 Ke (21 Grams) is based on the 1907 research by the American physician Dr...

Publica
© » KADIST

Liu Yin

2010

Liu Yin’s cartoon-like paintings and drawings explore the ambivalences of love, nature, and consumerism...

Island
© » KADIST

Kan Xuan

2006

In Kan Xuan’s four-channel video Island , a series of objects like nail clippers, hairbrush, toothpaste, and house decorations are shot in close-ups...

Until It Makes Sense
© » KADIST

Mario Garcia Torres

2004

Mario Garcia Torres imagines cinematic devices to replay stories occasionally forgotten by Conceptual art...

There are veins in these lands, I
© » KADIST

Rodney McMillian

2013

In his evocative Landscape Paintings, McMillian uses second-hand bedsheets, sourced from thrift shops, as his starting point...

I can’t believe we are still protesting
© » KADIST

Wong Wai Yin

2021

Drawn from the widely circulated images of protests around the world in support of women rights and racial equality, the phrase I can’t believe we are still protesting is both the title of Wong Wai Yin’s photographic series and a reference to similar messages seen on protest signages...

The Cloud of Unknowing
© » KADIST

Ho Tzu Nyen

2011

The Cloud of Unknowing (2011) is titled after a 14th-century medieval treatise on faith, in which “the cloud of unknowing” that stands between the aspirant and God can only be evoked by the senses, rather than the rational mind...

Untitled (Wheelchair drawing)
© » KADIST

Edgar Arceneaux

2006

Untitled (Wheelchair Drawing) is a ten-foot photo transfer of the image of a wheelchair with burning embers in its seat...

Tremble
© » KADIST

Jiang Zhi

2009

In the video installation Tremble, Jiang projected the life-size images of seven naked men and women onto seven individual screens...

5
© » KADIST

Jiang Zhi

2012

5 is a three channel video about the dualities of death and resurrection, reminiscence and fantasy, chronological and retrospective narration...

No World
© » KADIST

Fang Lu

2014

No World is an action-filled video work filmed inside an abandoned museum in the Songzhuang area outside Beijing...

Open Mind
© » KADIST

Yoan Capote

2007

Open Mind is a model created by Capote for a traversable public maze that, when seen from above, resembles the human brain...

The Tower of Babel: Independence of the country
© » KADIST

Du Zhenjun

2010

The Tower of Babel is an installation of large-format photographs that forces the audience to occupy a central position through its monumental scale...

Tribute to Inside Looking Out - For the male artists along my way
© » KADIST

Wong Wai Yin

2008

In this work the artist stages a humorously violent “intervention” against male-dominated cultures of art production in present-day China...