DE SARTHE
Hong Kong, China
Pearl Rolling Across the Floor
2020
Liang Ban believes that in the current era mobile devices have evolved to become a “possessive technology”, that is one which has taken control of its users. In the same way that ships, planes, and cars influenced architecture in the early 20th century, the artist captures how mobile devices have influenced modern humanity.
Sharing a title with the exhibition, the multimedia installation Pearl Rolling Across the Floor (2020) consists Chinese guardian lions either sitting atop a digital screen, or resting one of its legs on top of it. Constructed using crystal clear blocks, the lions appear as clear and pure as glass. Yet, its material is ironically the same as that of counterfeit treasures produced by corrupted manufacturers in Southern China. The invention of glass is historically important. It was imported into China from the west early on, but was overlooked and rarely utilized as a construction material. China’s historical tendency to steer away from glass seemingly speaks to the transparency of the Chinese political framework. By recreating stone lions using a transparent material, the artist undermines the traditional conception that “the lion is a symbol of power and status”. The digital screens, on which the lions sit, display video fragments of a person periodically flipping through printed images of interior floors. As the reader turns the page, the distant sound of a pearl rolling across the floor plays in the background.
The weight of the floor is lifted by the lightness of the pages, the solidity of the lion is deconstructed by the transparency of its building blocks, and the two are connected by the lack of visual presence of the pearl. From the artist’s perspective, pearls represent fragile individual entities and simultaneously are symbolic of Hong Kong, a city reputed as the “Pearl of the Orient.”
《滾過地板的珍珠》
2020
梁半認為手機在當下是一種控制個體的技術， 如同在20世紀初輪船，飛機，汽車對於現代建築的影響一樣，藝術家很敏銳地捕抓到生活在此刻的人類是如何被手機所改變的。
與展覽同名的錄像裝置作品《滾過地板的珍珠》(2020) ，由中國坐獅像分別腳踩在五個電子屏幕上構成。這些獅像均由水晶磚堆砌而成。這種水晶磚材料像玻璃一樣純淨透明，但同時它又是中國南方黑心廠家製作假珍寶的原材料。歷史上，玻璃是很重要的發明，它來自西方，很早傳入中國，但是歷史上中國一直不重視玻璃，避免使用玻璃。這跟中國的政治有著些許暗合，在藝術家看來透明是很重要的，所以藝術家利用這種透明性來打破“獅子是權威的象徵”這種傳統的看法。而獅像腳下的屏幕，由一系列不同時期室內地板的圖片不定時翻頁構成，翻頁的同時，背景則傳出珍珠滾過地板時發出的的聲音。沉重的地板被輕盈的紙頁自然替代，封固的獅像被一塊塊透明的水晶磚塊瓦解，兩者也因珍珠虛無的存在被聯繫在一起。在藝術家看來，“珍珠”代表著一個個獨立脆弱的個體，同時也隱喻被譽為「東方之珠」的香港。
DE SARTHE
Hong Kong, China
Diary of a Pioneer
2018
This is Liang Ban’s first solo exhibition in Hong Kong. The exhibition questions a conventional understanding of culture in which civilization and nature are diametrically opposed. With surrealist and humorous undertones, Liang Ban argues our idealized notion of a civilization constantly in progress dilutes a more complicated reality in which our relationship to nature and wilderness are closely connected. Within only four artworks, the exhibition carries viewers to a point of cathartic reflection on the impossibility of understanding human civilization.
《拓荒者日記 》
2018
這是梁半在香港的首次個展。本次展覽對傳統主流文化中文明與自然之間二元對立的關係進行了質詢。運用帶有超現實和幽默色彩的藝術語言，梁半提出了這樣的觀點：人們對不斷進步的文明的理想化詮釋，掩蓋了更為複雜的現實中我們與自然和荒野的緊密聯繫。僅通過四件作品，展覽便為觀眾們呈現了一種宣洩式的反省——對人類文明完美而正確的理解，是不存在的。
Klein Sun Gallery
New York, USA
Installation view of Liang Ban, Holy Friday
Installation view of Liang Ban, Magician of the Earth 1
Installation view of Liang Ban, Magician of the Earth 2
nstallation view of Liang Ban, Short Trip to the Moon
Liang Ban and Ye Funa: Self-Created Universe
2017
Curated by Beili Wang, the exhibition showcases a body of comical and unique multimedia works by the two artists. Collectively, they speak to our increasingly image-saturated world through producing and fabricating visual materials drawn from mass media, pop culture, and everyday life.
Liang Ban explores the theme of self-creating in a different realm. Often constructing a fictional narrative, Liang interweaves the real and the invented seamlessly through digital devices such as smartphones. Two videos--Short Trip to the Moon (2015) and Holy Friday (2016) --shown in the exhibition illustrate how the artist recounts real-life moments swiftly and humorously. In Short Trip to the Moon, a man played by the artist is stricken by lightning at the moment in which he is taking a picture with his selfie stick. The electrical power immediately runs through the man’s body, radiating his skeleton in an X-ray effect. Liang Ban’s works reveal his interest in alternating between reality and fantasy through his use of technical wizardry.
《梁半／葉甫納：自制世界》
2017
由王貝莉策展，展覽將推出兩位藝術家幽默怪誕的多媒體藝術作品。通過製造和重造源於大眾媒體、流行文化，和日常生活中的視覺素材兩位藝術家共同回應了我們日益被數碼圖像所渲染的世界。
梁半經常通過智能手機這樣的數碼科技將真實的和虛構的無縫地編織在其虛構的敘事中。在這次展覽中展出的兩件作品《月球之旅·留念》(2015) 和《耶穌受難日》(2016) 展現出藝術家對生活瞬間快速幽默的反應及重述。在《月球之旅·留念》裡，藝術家扮演的黑衣男子在用自拍杆拍照的一瞬被閃電擊中，電流貫穿全身，主人公的骨骼盡顯彷彿X光拍照的效果。這次展覽中的作品揭示了梁半通過使用他的“科技魔術”，來探索現實與幻想之間的可轉換性的極大興趣。
DE SARTHE
Beijing, China
Laing Ban, Stars, 2016, Vidéo à trois canaux, 3'00'', vue d'installation
Liangban, Stars, 2016, Tri canal vidéo, 03'00'' (Vue de l'installation)
Liangban, The Earth Magician No.3, 2016, Topological Map , phosphoresent spary-painting, 67 x 80 cm
Liangban, The Earth Magician No.2, 2016, Topologique Carte, phosphoresent spary peinture, 92 x 71 cm
Liangban, The Earth Magician No.2, 2016, Topologique Carte, phosphoresent spary peinture, 92 x 71 cm
Liangban, The Earth Magician No.1, 2016, Topologique Carte , phosphoresent spary peinture, 137 x 206 cm
Liangban, The Earth Magician No.1, 2016, Topological Map , phosphoresent spary-painting, 137 x 206 cm
Liangban, Evening Rambles, 2016, Aluminum structure, impression UV on planche de bois and spécimen perroquet, 394 x 685 x 11 cm
Liangban, Friends feed rapids, 2016, canal unique vidéo, 00'14''
Landscape Browser, curated by Bao Dong
2016-17
Liang Ban’s practice gained recognition with his groundbreaking “Hand of God” (2015) series. In this series the artist traversed deserts, forests, rivers and various other landscapes while carrying his mobile phone in order to connect the device’s internal operating system with the external environment around him. He achieved this by displaying images of scenery onto the mobile phone, then staging phone within the landscape and recording the resultant dialogue between device and nature. The videos portray a seemingly innocuous moment, but while viewing the work one quickly realizes the poetry contained within addresses contemporary notions of society, culture, and most prominently-landscape. An important component of Landscape Browser, the “Hand of God” series begins a conversation about the connotations and implications of landscape and how the subject is portrayed as a social commodity today. Furthering an exploration of landscape, a major installation, “Evening Ramble” (2016) recreates a version of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial in the gallery. Unlike the actual memorial, “Evening Ramble” is covered in dirt, grime, and bird droppings made by a living parrot. Another piece titled “The Earth Magician No.1″ (2016) is a 3D topological map that is hung on a wall of the gallery and covered with phosphorescent spray-paint that extends off of the map and onto the wall itself. A new video work, “Hole” (2016), plays in reverse footage of Coca-Cola cans and coins being thrown into a deep cave. Collectively, the artworks approach an alternate and critically engaging theory behind the significance of landscape in contemporary global society.
《風景瀏覽器》由鮑棟策展
2016-17
梁半的創作從《上帝之手》系列開始受到關注。藝術家手持智能手機往來不絕於荒漠、森林、大海、川流等自然景觀裡，將手機內部操作系統與外在環境（圖像）拼貼在一起，同時用另一部手機記錄此過程。這些每部僅為幾十秒鐘的視頻看似輕巧，卻可在一瞬間讓人感受到巨大的能量與詩意。這是藝術家對於自身和周遭種種情境的反思以及他對於政治文化與現實社會的隱喻。此次個展當中，梁半通過不同的創作媒材，再次針對圖像的利用和破壞，將日常觀察與全球化語境拼接鑲嵌，以表露自然主義的個人情懷和後資本主義流離的公共領域之間的風景。
從古至今，「風景」似乎在人類身上給予了某種微妙力量，引發出廣泛且難以詳述人類自身發展的情感認知與觀念。從野蠻到文明、從荒野到城市都存在於虛構當中；而這些虛構經過周而復始的表述後，最終成了現實，猶如此次展出作品當中的"黃昏漫步" (2016) 裝置即為美國拉什莫爾山國家紀念碑的縮影圖，它被視為實踐無數活動的景點，而在這當中所衍生出的風景明信片或傳說，令這些自然景觀變成了一種全球化消費的產物。因此與這個紀念碑有關的任何實踐都可能激活此處，已不再是普遍意義上的觀光勝地，則是任何人想像力渲染的對象。這次展覽所關注的並不是風景作為觀看的物體或者閱讀的文本，而是將風景視為一種文化實踐，進而展開關於現實的表述。
Taikang Space
Beijing, China
Slightly Confused
2016-17
“Liang Ban: Slightly Concussed” presents ten short videos which were shot with smartphone, or specifically speaking, its camera and touchpad at different venues/backgrounds during the past one year. Shown in loops, these short videos record respectively how the artist manipulates another smartphone under diverse background settings. All these videos share the same features: They are very succinct and brief. Here one can find a quiet humor form time to time interrupted by some unexpected elements. Just like the title of the exhibition, a humble comedy with meaningful implications.
《輕微腦震盪》
2016-17
“梁半：輕微腦震盪”帶來了十枚短小的影像作品。它們是藝術家梁半在過去的一年中利用蘋果手機的攝像功能和触屏特性，分別在不同的地點和環境下完成的。這些循環播放的短片分別記錄下藝術家在不同的場景設置中針對另一部手機所進行的操作，而它們都有著共同的特點：極短小，簡潔，在不動聲色的幽默背後，植入某種不確定的干擾因素——就像展覽的標題一樣，是一部謙遜而另具用意的喜劇。
CHENGDU A4 CONTEMPORARY ARTS CENTER
CHENGDU, CHINA
Work in the poster: Liang Ban, Model, 2014, Single channel video, 03'00"
Liang Ban: Game
2014
Liang Ban's works have always maintained a serious humor. From "Games" to "Models", the artist reproduces historical images or symbolic behaviors through deduction, play, and metonymy in the game between individual roles and social roles, between artists and objects; This breaks through the shackles of ideology, historical review, and game rules, and liberates the ambiguity and derivation of the image itself from the subsidiary context of rights, culture, and consciousness.
從《遊戲》到《模特》，藝術家將人物角色與社會角色之間，藝術家與對象，之間的博弈，通過演繹，戲耍，轉喻的方式，對歷史圖像或像徵行為進行影像再現；並同時突破意識形態，歷史評述，和遊戲規則的桎梏，將圖像本身的多義性與衍生性從權利，文化，意識的附屬語境中解放出來。