Everything Before, Everything After

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The main body of this digital installation is a meandering river rendered in Chinese ink painting style. The river, simulated by the rules of meanders, constantly shifts its path as it flows, marks time and leaves behind the transition traces. Chinese traditional ink painting is characterised not only by the fluidity of the ink that represents the flow of time, but also by the panoramic expression of space that can not be contained in a single view. This artwork aims at rejuvenating this zen concept in the digital age and extend it through motion and interactive properties.

The visuals are rendered on 2 touch screens. By touching the screen, visitors are invited to paint their own strokes to the artwork. Not only does the visitors’ strokes stay on the canvas, but they also apply additional forces to the meandering simulation. As such, the originally predictable shapeshifting of the river becomes an irreducible and unpredictable process, therefore, the ink river becomes the history itself promoted by both the flow of the environment and human interruptions. What the audiences see at an exact moment is no longer just “now”, but the summary of “everything before”. With visitors’ participatory disruptions, the river carries what it has accumulated into the future - thus “everything after”. Furthermore, once the artwork’s software starts running, all the process and interactive strokes are recorded, and the status of the river is never being reset. This ensures the ink river really becomes the medium that carries the eternity of the artwork and becomes the river that flows through spacetime.