My Things - Bookkeeping of 2006 A
Hong Hao
洪浩
Production date
2006
Object Detail
Media
digital print of scanned images
Measurements
120 x 204 cm
Notes
In Hong Hao’s ‘My Things’ series, as private consumption is made public, these ordinary objects have become his subject as well as his materials. My Things—Bookkeeping of 2006 A (2006) reveals the multi-coloured complexity of everyday urban life in a particular way. Packaging, plastic containers of various kinds, and individual objects are arranged in a grid of rectangular shapes that emerge in startling clarity from the black ground. The longer sides of A4 paper boxes, plastic wrap, a box of tofu, tissue packets, chocolates and biscuits are interspersed with post-it notes, business cards, receipts and tickets, pens and lightbulbs – even a cucumber. This reminds us that Mandarin Chinese has many different ‘measure words’ for objects of different shapes and functions — there is a specific measure word for long, thin, flattish things, and another for roundish things, or bunches of things, so Hong’s arrangements may appear logically ordered in less obvious ways for Chinese viewers.
Accession number
2015.177