One Kind of Behaviour
Shyu Ruey-Shiann
徐瑞憲
Production date
2000-2007
Object Detail
Media
metal construction, motors, buckets, plywood
Measurements
installed 450 x 900 cm, dimensions variable
Notes
One Kind of Behaviour (2000—2007) is a deceptively simple idea. Inspired by the opening and closing shells of hermit crabs, Shyu created an installation of more than fifty mechanical steel buckets. Operated by sensors, they come alive as visitors pass by, clattering and crashing noisily in an absurd cacophony, as if inhabited by recalcitrant creatures who shyly hide, then poke out their heads to see what’s around them. As with almost all Shyu’s works, for One Kind of Behaviour the artist spent years perfecting the mechanical systems. Made from found and fabricated materials including discarded motors, pulleys and switches, One Kind of Behaviour is about childhood memory: the buckets are the same as those used by Taiwanese schoolchildren in the 1970s to clean their classrooms, harking back to a simpler time.
Accession number
2014.194