2024

Documentary film：
                                          👉🏻︎ (Düsseldorf)
                                          👉🏻︎ (London)
                                           👉🏻︎ (Paris)
                                     

Project funded by the Düsseldorf Art Commission stadt.raum.experimente 2024.



Project: Performance art experiment
Project progress:Paris, France;
                                  London, England;
                                  Düsseldorf, Germany

（"Flâneur," a French term, originally depicted 19th-century urban strollers in Paris, utilized to explore urban space, modernity, and capitalist consumer culture. Traditionally seen as an independent observer, the flâneur would aimlessly wander the city, maintaining a certain distance to observe the city's changes and people's daily lives. With accelerated urbanization and rapid technological development, our lives have become more efficient and swift. Time and space exert unprecedented pressure on people, making their life experiences and perceptions more mechanical and fast-paced. These changes deeply impact individual lifestyles and the existence and value of the role of the "flâneur."

Drawing inspiration from fragments of Walter Benjamin's "The Arcades Project" (in Paris of 1840, strolling with a tortoise became a favorite activity of urban wanderers), the work collaborates with local seniors, wandering the city with a mechanical biometric tortoise. Through an experiment with flâneur performance art, the 19th-century wanderer from Benjamin's work is revived (the project is expected to conduct performance art experiments in several locations).

Especially in recent decades, with the continuous development of the economy, urbanisation and the pace of life accelerating, we are always accustomed to speeding up our pace to match the ever-changing social changes, and it seems that we have already become accustomed to such a life. In such an environment, we gradually forget the changes in the space around us and the meaning of our lives. The technological revolution, represented by electronic maps, has made us lose our sensitivity and control of our lives more quickly in pursuit of an efficient and convenient lifestyle. This makes each of us an active participant in today's society.

We use Google Maps to find the shortest routes and choose the quickest transport to get to the end point we have set. While we feel the convenience of technology, it has gradually accelerated the pace of our lives for personal and societal efficiency. Nowadays, each individual becomes an important part of the social machine, and it becomes valuable and idealistic to view society from a calm and objective standpoint. In this context, it is particularly important to rethink the role of the "Flâneur," or the value of its existence. 🐢





“Flâneur”是一个法语术语（此时资本主义和消费主义在欧洲蓬勃发展，为满足城市不断增长的消费需求新的城市模型开始孕育而成）。城市的漫游者在漫步中探索和观察城市空间，当代性，以及资本主义消费文化的出现和发展。传统意义中，flauner常常被视为独立的观察者，他们在城市中漫无目的的闲逛，从“远处”去观察这座被经济发展所改变的城市以及人们生活场所状态的变化。

我觉得flanuer它代表的不仅仅是19世纪法国的一种文化现象或者历史现象，它同时也代表了在19世纪的一种生活状态或者是一种生活方式。但是随着经济的发展，消费主义的盛行，伴随而来的是它不断调整和改变着我们的生活节奏，方式，喜好甚至是习惯。尤其是近几十年，全球经济飞速发展，城市化程度，科技水平不断提高，我们的生活变得更加高效和快捷，但时间和空间却让人们感受到前所未有的压迫感，从而让我们的体验和感知变得越发机械和快速。在这种状态下每个人都成为“社会机器”的重要参与者，冷静客观地去感受“城市”变得越发的理想化。

作品受到本雅明《拱廊街计划》（1840年在巴黎，牵着乌龟在拱廊街散步是一件特别优雅的事情）的启发。将与巴黎当地老人合作，老人通过牵着缓慢爬行的仿生乌龟机器人在巴黎城市街道漫步。将穿过同一空间下的不同历史“景观”，通过一种缓慢的方式重新审视和观察这个因经济发展和消费主义而改变的城市。同时也希望引起大家思考200年间“优雅”的定义又因何而改变。

作品将通过摄像机记录下整个过程，通过和“flanuer”一起走上街头，记录如今城市日常风貌，玲琅满目的商品橱窗，精心搭配的高级服装，复古与现代的建筑，车水马龙的街道。Flanuer在这种环境如同插入公共空间的“异物”，为了适应当代空间它需要不断的变化和调整自己的状态。不管是人们对其投来异样或新奇的目光或者熟视无睹，flanuer这一行为都会成为现代化人类文明发展的异类。缓慢而不追求效率的状态最终会成为一种“自我陶醉式”的乌托邦幻境。

Flanuer即是观察者，也是参与者更是记录者，也同时是警示者。尽管它在19世纪如此“优雅”，但在如今如此当代性的今天它的存在却成为一种时代的虚影。




我们使用谷歌地图来寻找最短的路线并选择最快捷的交通来抵达我们所设定的终点。我们在感受到科技带来便利的同时，它也逐渐加快了我们的生活节奏，以实现个人和社会的效率提升。如今，每个人都成为社会机器的重要组成部分，以冷静客观的立场看待社会变得有价值和理想化。在这种情况下，重新思考“闲逛者”的角色或者其存在的价值就显得尤为重要。

本雅明