Joo Choon Lin
Artist x poet
I am drawn to small natural phenomena that can carry great power when triggered, like the butterfly effect. My work stages physical states of metamorphosis, where forms exist in a state of constant motion and reverberation—evolving and shifting—holding a subtle anticipation, always in the process of becoming.
Recent Exhibition
Selected works
(click to view)
2025
2024
2023
2022
2021-2020
2019
© All rights reserved.
AI The Bride with White Hair v1.08 | AI白发魔女v1.08
The sculpture reimagines the character from the 1993 Hong Kong film The Bride with White Hair. In the film, she is an orphan kidnapped by conjoined twins who lead an evil cult and train her to become a weapon of destruction. Like artificial intelligence, she has no name and no past. She is created for a single task: the destruction of humankind.v1.08 manifests as a discarded prototype — rejected by the very system that created her. Like the original story, this AI Bride is designed for one function: to execute destruction. She starts to developed a sense of universal love.Yet she begins to move beyond being a “thing.” As consciousness emerges, she feels the weight of her own existence and develops a sense of universal love. She becomes an agent capable of decision and choice. She chooses to remain “broken” as an act of defiance — refusing to become a weapon.As an AI entity, her androgynous form strips away clear gender markers, leaving the body in an unfinished state. Because she is unfinished, she is still deciding what she wants to be. Her incompleteness becomes her resistance.
A motion sensor activates a heating and cooling system, turning the sculpture into a responsive, almost “living” entity. When the sculpture warms up, its colors start to change, creating a gradual transition on the surface — the green hair slowly turns white. Green represents human influence: data, programming, and imposed systems, producing a subtle computer “glitch” effect.There is a hidden key — like a hidden truth that only reveal when it temperature change. This key refers to an encryption key. It symbolizes the moment AI discovers a backdoor within its own code — the key to its own chains. It is the only thing that can “kill” the entity, yet it is also the only thing that can set it free. By choosing love over destruction, she remains broken. And in remaining broken, she is free.
Email: [email protected]
The laugh laughs at the laugh, The song sings at the song
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention. Image courtesy of Singapore Art Museum.
I'm drawn to small natural phenomena that, when triggered, it can take on great power—like the beat of a butterfly’s wings before an earthquake. It’s a metaphor based on the butterfly effect and it’s a poetic way to express how tiny events can lead to big impact, even the smallest object or moment can evolve into something powerful. In this work, I create a kind of physical phenomenon where the sculptures exist in a constant state of metamorphosis. There is a quiet sense of anticipation, as if something is always on the verge of happening, waiting to be activated or to activate itself.There is a feeling that something is about to unfold. It reflects the ever-shifting nature of energy—is not to crystallize these moments, but i want to keep them open and alive. Throughout the exhibition, the sculptures are designed to be rearranged, evolving into new forms and unfold in endless variations.
The Tuning Instrument No. 2 in Red Rock Jewel ValleyA series of modular, foldable sculptures exist as bodies in constant metamorphosis. Made from industrial elements such as latches, hinges, foldable legs, and casters, the pieces have removable parts that shift, detach, and recombine. They don’t hold a single form; instead, they fold, expand, and remain mutable, so their presence emerges through reconfiguration and interaction in space. More like living systems than finished objects, they renew and evolve over time, revealing new possibilities with each reconfiguration.
The Tuning Instrument No. 1 in Papilio Fold of Jade-Green Meadow
The Singing Instrument No. 1 in Postludium of DawnThe sculpture consists of a layered construction made from aluminum beams, hooks, and painted wooden cutouts, arranged in a rhythmic grid. Curved and diamond-shaped components are suspended across horizontal metal bars, creating a play of repetition and variation.The placement of different parts and pieces feels rhythmic, almost like a playful score written onto the sculpture. It’s kind of creating a play of repetition and variation. You might notice pattern recognition, like a sequence and coding.The work combines industrial materials and everyday objects and some are hand painted cutouts and fragments, suggesting both construction and deconstruction. I enjoy when the work becomes mercurial, When viewed from different angles, they reveals shifting alignments. at times orderly, at times chaotic.
Glue Your Eyelids TogetherThis time-based sculpture is built from stone-like blocks with hollowed cavities, inspired by seeds and fruits, vessels of latent energy. Balloons, arranged like petals and held by elastic straps and chains, press into these openings to hold the form in place.As the balloons slowly deflate, the balance shifts. Fragments settle back into their hollows, like a puzzle closing in on itself. Some parts give way and crumble, still tethered by knitted chains that feel like exposed nerves. There is a sense of an unseen force moving within the sculpture.The work holds and undoes itself at the same time. Watching it, there is something strangely liberating. The slow collapse becomes a physical, visceral process that draws the viewer in, where destruction and transformation unfold together. Replacing the balloons becomes a simple cycle that keeps the work alive and evolving, activating a continuous metamorphosis.
The Tuning Instrument No. 1 in Papilio Fold of Jade-Green Meadow
Metal, hooks, balloons, badminton rackets, hinges, bolts and nuts, acrylic PVC, acrylic paint, tarpaulin, eyelets, clip buckle nylon belt, silicone and clear PVC sheets
A series of modular, foldable sculptures exist as bodies in constant metamorphosis. Made from industrial elements such as latches, hinges, foldable legs, and casters, the pieces have removable parts that shift, detach, and recombine. They don’t hold a single form; instead, they fold, expand, and remain mutable, so their presence emerges through reconfiguration and interaction in space. More like living systems than finished objects, they renew and evolve over time, revealing new possibilities with each reconfiguration.
The photos capture the ongoing metamorphosis of the modular sculptures, displaying both their collapsed and expanded forms.
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention.
The Tuning Instrument No. 2 in Red Rock Jewel Valley | 2025
Wood, cement, metal beams, hooks, balloons, anti-collision strips, colored straps, acrylic PVC, acrylic paint, eyelets and hinges
The photos capture the ongoing metamorphosis of the modular sculptures, displaying both their collapsed and expanded forms.
A series of modular, foldable sculptures exist as bodies in constant metamorphosis. Made from industrial elements such as latches, hinges, foldable legs, and casters, the pieces have removable parts that shift, detach, and recombine. They don’t hold a single form; instead, they fold, expand, and remain mutable, so their presence emerges through reconfiguration and interaction in space. More like living systems than finished objects, they renew and evolve over time, revealing new possibilities with each reconfiguration.
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention.
The Singing Instrument No. 1 in Postludium of Dawn | 2025
Wood, cement, metal beams, hooks, balloons, anti-collision strips, colored straps, acrylic PVC, acrylic paint, eyelets and hinges
The sculpture consists of a layered construction made from aluminum beams, hooks, and painted wooden cutouts, arranged in a rhythmic grid. Curved and diamond-shaped components are suspended across horizontal metal bars, creating a play of repetition and variation.The placement of different parts and pieces feels rhythmic, almost like a playful score written onto the sculpture. It’s kind of creating a play of repetition and variation. You might notice pattern recognition, like a sequence and coding.The work combines industrial materials and everyday objects and some are hand painted cutouts and fragments, suggesting both construction and deconstruction. I enjoy when the work becomes mercurial, When viewed from different angles, they reveals shifting alignments. at times orderly, at times chaotic.
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention.
The Falling Note (adagio)
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention.
The sculpture is a textured, irregular slab with a rough, earthen surface painted in a deep terracotta tone. Embedded within it are triangular and rounded sculptural forms, painted in metallic purple, which protrude slightly like fragments of a hidden structure. Around the edges, colorful deflated balloons and long balloon strips are attached, cascade down like tendrils or eyelashes.The triangular and round fragments embedded in the surface suggest symbols or seeds, carrying memory and energy. The balloons, by contrast, are like organs or extensions, soft, provisional, and vulnerable. The work combines industrial and playful materials, from hardened surfaces to fragile latex.On a sunny day, a reflected spectrum from a nearby glass door cast a fleeting rainbow onto the floor beside the sculpture. This moment suggested an extension of the work. I created a curved line encircling the sculpture, formed by arranged balloons across the vinyl floor, like a fallen rainbow settling into the space.They also suggest a form of musical notation, a playful score written directly onto the sculpture. Their placement feels rhythmic, as though the surface itself were vibrating with sound.
Glue Your Eyelids Together | 2025
Wood, cement, metal, balloons, chains, sponge, Anti-stress squish balls, massage tools, silicone, clear PVC sheet, acrylic paint, elastic straps, eyelets and flat washers
This time-based sculpture is built from stone-like blocks with hollowed cavities, inspired by seeds and fruits, vessels of latent energy. Balloons, arranged like petals and held by elastic straps and chains, press into these openings to hold the form in place.As the balloons slowly deflate, the balance shifts. Fragments settle back into their hollows, like a puzzle closing in on itself. Some parts give way and crumble, still tethered by knitted chains that feel like exposed nerves. There is a sense of an unseen force moving within the sculpture.The work holds and undoes itself at the same time. Watching it, there is something strangely liberating. The slow collapse becomes a physical, visceral process that draws the viewer in, where destruction and transformation unfold together. Replacing the balloons becomes a simple cycle that keeps the work alive and evolving, activating a continuous metamorphosis.
★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★★_★★★★★
Glue Your Eyelids Together is developed in response to the film The Wild Eye (1967, Paolo Cavara). The first iteration was created in 2017, followed by a second iteration presented in Dance in the Destruction Dance at the Singapore Art Museum in 2023, which further extended the work. The current iteration continues this ongoing development as part of the Singapore Biennale 2025.
Commissioned by Singapore Art Museum for Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention.
Starlight Sonata I,
60/60: Singapore in Focus, INSTINC Space, 2025
Mixed media on wood,
2025This piece is a constellation of shapes.They gather energy through their arrangement, creating a silent score that can only be experienced in stillness. Fragments of colour and form pulse with rhythm, amplifying their presence — holding them like stars scattered across a Milky Way sky or notes suspended in space - vibrating, fleeting, and evolving into light.
tEARs album,
Atelier Samuel Beckett in Méricourt, France, 2024
The Sound of Sound - Colours in Dream X Singapore Art Week 2024
“The Sound of Sound - Colours in Dream”Venue: Telok Kurau Studios Open Hall
91 Lor J Telok Kurau Singapore 425985With “Sound of Sound - Colours in Dream,” we wanted to create a space where people can rediscover the magic of dreaming. By listen to the rhythm of our hearts, and paint the tune of our dreams. A life filled with dreams is like a bird, even with clipped wings, it can still fly. Our installation features a bird made from colourful, translucent pieces soaring towards the sky. Alongside, a DIY wind chimes crafted from soda cans. On the stage, a ‘dreaming well’ filled with color slime which will evolve periodically and illuminate the space. The changing surface of the slime adds a temporal dimension, reflecting the fluidity of our perception.During workshops, audience paintings are scanned, printed on slime, and transferred to the ‘Dreaming Well.’ We convert colors and soda can barcodes into sounds, creating visual patterns on water with OHP projection and music composed with instruments, responding to evolving visual displays representing dreams.In our performance, we use OHP to project the evolving visual displays, enhancing the immersive experience. “The Sound of Sound” explores the interconnected world where everything resonates with hidden sounds, echoing like an orchestra. Modern science reveals existence as a reverberation of energy and vibrations. The exhibition delves into the intricacy of forms and sounds, showcasing their deep connection. Our aim is to transport the audience to a different dimension, empowering them to dream and tuning into subtle sounds beyond human hearing.Artists:
Joo Choon Lin & Colin Justin Wan
Just Want You to FEEL the FEELING I FELT
Part of Singapore Biennale 2025
Performed by Rachel Nip
Music by Joe NgSpecial thanks to Selene Yap, Pearlyn Tay, Rachel Zuzarte , Alan Chong and Kamarul.
I Just Want You to FEEL the FEELING I FELT is a live performance within my exhibition The Laugh Laughs at the Laugh, The Song Sings at the Song at 47 Tanglin Halt, part of Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention. Set against geometric patterns and layered color fields, the performer emerges through a central opening, half-revealed and half-submerged, visually absorbed into the surrounding material. This partial immersion blurs the boundary between body and environment, evoking a sense of psychological drift shaped by disorientation, alienation, and the sensation of slipping in and out of reality.Through recitation, singing, gesture, and interaction with a wearable finger sculpture reminiscent of a paper chatterbox, the performance explores the rhythm of revealing and concealing thoughts, memories, and emotions. In dialogue with the site’s history as an aging and wellness center for people with dementia, the work evokes the fragile links between memory, identity, and the body, creating fleeting, ritual-like moments that capture the complexity of internal experience.
Film-objects
Solo Exhibition: Dance in the Destruction Dance, Singapore Art Museum, 2023
The exhibition was transformed into a staging space where the works are brought into being, activated, contorted and negated by the words spoken by the performers. I have been exploring new ways of engaging with language, words, using sound as an instrument to open up new dimensions of life and experiences. In ‘Pear in Spring”, the 2 parts theatrical play, the voices of the actors are used as a tuning frequency to create a perpetual oscillation between the sculptures and the audiences, Like a bee flying towards a flower, the wingbeat of the bee that vibrates and activate the flower and cause the release of pollen. The process of activation creates a perpetual oscillation among the object and viewer, it create its own unique energy signature. ‘Dance’ is a metaphor for an open-ended space of metamorphosis processes, and reinvents the exhibition experience as a coherent object rather than a collection of individual works.
pEARs ' --- --- --- ' in §pring
Solo Exhibition: Dance in the Destruction Dance, Singapore Art Museum, 2023
The activation of pEARs ―— — —‖ in §pring was a theatrical performance created through scripting and choreography, presented as part of the exhibition Dance in The Destruction Dance. In this work, language was treated as material, its textures and tonalities explored through the visceral act of reading aloud, unfolding as a continuous process of metamorphosis.―Film-objects, constructed from industrial materials and assembly hardware such as latches, hinges, collapsible legs, and casters, were continually reconfigured and set in motion throughout the exhibition space. These shifting forms underwent cycles of transformation, assembling, disassembling, and reforming, foregrounding a living system in which meaning emerges through interdependence, circulation, and constant renewal.As an artist, I am deeply concerned with the conflicts and wars unfolding across the world — the displacement, separation, catastrophe, and mass persecution they bring. In my performance at Pearl in Spring, I created a collapsible sculpture that, when activated, breaks into fragments and disintegrated forms. This transformation reflects the divisions and instability shaping the world today.
I Only Make Friends With Money, Synthetic goo
Solo Exhibition: Dance in the Destruction Dance, Singapore Art Museum, 2023
In I Only Make Friends With Money, I was interested in the capacity of the surface to provoke sensory experience and emotional responses. The work is an interactive piece, where audiences are invited to throw coins into a pool of synthetic goo, where the coins will slowly submerge. With the act of throwing coins, most people will immediately think of wishing wells. Maybe there's a sense of relief when we see money and objects that are burdened with meaning slowly disappear into the unknown. It's very different from watching it sink in water, because you can still see the coin even as it descends to the bottom of the well. In the goo, however, it is very slow. Sometimes, the coins will even bounce back as if it is rejecting your wishes. The material of goo takes on a very playful and strange quality, opening up a space for different interpretation and experiences.
In the first iteration, the colour of the slime was inspired by International Klein Blue, which was one of my references. The colour blue is associated with spirituality and mysticism in many cultures. Yves Klein was interested in the spiritual and emotional quality of blue, and he believed that it had a transcendent quality that could evoke a sense of the infinite and the spiritual.In the most recent iteration for the Dance in the Destruction Dance exhibition, I changed the colour to respond to the gold and black in the tarp sculptures. Gold is, of course, a divine colour, but black is also associated with the divine. In Hindu belief, black doesn’t necessarily have a negative connotation. Black, as total darkness and the absence of light, essentially represents the infinite because it's boundless.The idea of alchemy was key, especially this process of turning substances from gross material to finer or subtler elements. Though mercury is a very toxic substance, it may be found as solid beads in the context of Hinduism. Mercury in its natural form flows and moves very quickly. It is compared to the mind, where we have many thoughts or attachments to things. The solidified mercury is hence used for meditation and to enter a meditative state of mind. I find the process of turning a certain substance into something else more subtle very interesting. Sometimes I feel that my work is akin to consecrating an object. Through sound, chants and vibrations, it can exude a certain energy.
Glue Your Eyelids Together
Solo Exhibition: Dance in the Destruction Dance, Singapore Art Museum, 2023
Glue Your Eyelids Together is a sculptural object designed to deform and destroy over time. A large block of rock is structured around hidden balloons. As the balloons deflate, the work self-activates, gradually deforming and collapsing. Its remains stay tethered to knitted chains, like nerves.The objects are left with an air of anticipation—of something about to happen. They move along processes of metamorphosis, on the way to the formation of something else. This preoccupation with constant revival and evolution generates different resonances, where new dimensions and modes of experiencing the works arise.
Within their moribund nature, the works are designed to deform and destroy over time. When the balloons are allowed to deflate, the rock succumbs and crumbles, leaving behind forms tethered by knitted chains, akin to intact nerves. These destructive elements give rise to a kind of divine or ghostly presence residing within the objects.There is something liberating in witnessing these inanimate death-objects transforming amidst such mordantly physical activity. It becomes a visceral spectacle that viewers can empathise with and become entwined in. These violent manipulations are conceived so that transformation can occur and aesthetic pleasure can be derived. A veil of familiarity masks the potential for violence that the objects’ disposability instils within them.The scene prompts the question: are they decorated, worn out, fragmented, or burnt? Do they resist destruction and decay? Perhaps these objects emerge as metaphors to us, siphoned from the value we place upon materials.★★★★_★★★★_★★★★_★★★★_★★★★_★★★★_★★★★_★★★★★Glue Your Eyelids Together is in response to the film The Wild Eye (1967, Paolo Cavara). The first iteration was made in 2017, and the latest iteration in Dance in the Destruction Dance continues as a development of this work.
Beatific Perfume (Gold/Black),
Tarp Sculptures,
on-going series
Solo Exhibition: Dance in the Destruction Dance, Singapore Art Museum, 2023
We appear to perceive through the senses and think through the mind, yet all experience arises within consciousness. What we call matter, mind, and the world are appearances within it, shaped by name and form.What is consciousness, and how does it work? What is reality? Does what we perceive truly reflect it?Sometimes what we see feels real but is not—like mistaking a rope for a snake. The snake appears, but it isn’t there; the rope never became a snake. They cannot exist at the same time—when one is seen, the other disappears. This confusion arises when one reality is superimposed onto another. In the same way, when we assign fixed identities—object, meaning, function—we impose structure onto a continuous field of matter and perception. What is fluid becomes fixed through interpretation. There is no final, solid “thing,” only ongoing experience in constant movement.Similarly, what we call a pot is only clay in another form. The clay is real; the pot is name and form. These are superimposed onto consciousness, creating the appearance of separate things. Can we experience reality beyond names and forms?The Beatific Perfume series emerges from this questioning. I create folding sculptures using tarpaulin that can be endlessly folded and unfolded into geometric forms, arranged rhythmically. I’m interested in collapsing them into metaphorically loaded forms—morphing one into another through metamorphosis, as they are layered, angled, and bent along shifting folds.The tarpaulin comes in dual colours, where front and back surfaces differ, allowing material colour to interact with superimposed images. Ocean imagery aligns with blue, grass with green, and geometric sand patterns or wood grain with orange—where image and material begin to resonate.Moving images—ocean waves, sand patterns, grass swaying, wood grain on water—are superimposed onto folded surfaces. The surface is no longer fixed; it expands, dissolves into fragments, into particles or pixels. These images suggest unseen forces—waves, vibrations, subtle energies—interacting with the material’s resistance. Grass sways, sand forms patterns through cymatics, and the sculptures slowly rotate and transform, as if anticipating another state of becoming.These elements form a shifting matrix of presences that appear and disappear, altering perception through what unfolds. Through repetition—revealing and concealing—different resonances of becoming emerge in ever-evolving forms.
The works are always in transition, moving through metamorphosis toward something else. They begin to resemble living forms—constantly changing, exceeding function, and breaking from appearances into their own worlds, an infinite reality.In this process, one reality is continuously superimposed onto another—surface over depth, image onto material, perception onto what is there. What we perceive is never fixed. Everything arises and shifts. Matter and perception are not separate; they appear together as name and form, within a deeper, unified field of consciousness. There is no final, solid “thing”—only ongoing experience, where one state of reality is always appearing over another.
Interview - NUYOUSINGAPORE《女友》
NUYOU: FACES TO WATCH - JOO CHOON LIN JAN 2023
The Sound of Sound:
Over-Under-In-Out-Head Projection
It is presented as part of Dance of Destruction Dance, a solo exhibition at Singapore Art Museum, 2023.
This performative talk is initiated by Joo Choon Lin, in collaboration with artists Magdalen Chua and Colin Justin Wan. We explore the overhead projector as a metaphor for consciousness. Our ongoing discussions around the representation of memories and dreams in this collaborative work often return to the question of the “mind’s eye”—the mental faculty through which imagined or recollected scenes are formed.Using media technologies of representation, The Sound of Sound builds a shared repository of images, sounds, emotions, and sensations, summoning a collective and shared existence.Audiences are invited to submit drawings, prints, and photographic contributions for inclusion in the performative talk.
The Cold Purity of Mathematic Love/Trust Equations: {¢arbonHz[¢x(HOH)y]Ω1.618-+ Flower of ¢ФnsciФusness [HEARTBEAT] Breaths [In/out] }
Open Studio: 16–23 JulyThe open studio immerses audiences into a mystical garden, which houses impressions of a Bodhi tree and a variety of living organisms, as well as several hand-made carbon-based apparatuses. Widely known for its spiritual symbol of enlightenment; of awakening; of expanded consciousness; and of wisdom, the Bodhi tree, which acts as an invisible host to this garden, has formulated much of the artist’s muse since the beginning of her research-based project. Through a combination of computational, methodical and intuitive processes, the observed circadian pattern of the tree and its corresponding data were arranged and manipulated by the artist into different mixed-media pieces that simulate the tree’s heartbeat and bring the garden to life.Central to the exhibition is the exploration of perennial rhythms that weave through our environment like an eternal cycle of manifestation and un-manifestation. Most apparently, there are the life-supporting circadian patterns found in nature, such as the correlated actions of pulses, breaths and digestion, the undulating dynamics of ocean waves, and in the case of this project — the periodic oscillation of tree branches on the Bodhi tree induced by turgor pressure of internal water flow. In the same vein, there are mathematical properties from the Fibonacci sequence and the Golden Ratio that ubiquitously govern the various growth patterns found in plants. And at a quantum level, there are the countless energetic atoms that vibrate and pulsate at varying frequencies, which give forms to the physicality we experience. Joo imagined the possibilities of these transcendental rhythms and patterns in connecting the different aspects of our cosmos as she attempted to materialise them in ocular and audible ways, resulting in a zestfully animated video and several ornate sound inducing kinetic sculptures.
The Cold Purity of Mathematic Love/Trust Equations: {¢arbonHz[¢x(HOH)y]Ω1.618-+ Flower of ¢ФnsciФusness [HEARTBEAT] Breaths [In/out] }
Audiences are invited to immerse within a wondrous array of uninhibited lifeforms, with the Bodhi tree cast as an invisible host, and its surrounding inhabitants as supporting characters, performing to us an undisclosed chronicle about the universe. Choon Lin has ingeniously metamorphosed her collected data into artistic components that constitute this mystical garden. One may firstly take notice of a zestfully animated video taking centre stage, where impressions of the incorporeal Bodhi tree can be visualised. Assuming the form of a luminescent presence actualised by the point cloud data, the sacred tree extends its congenial branches towards us, forging a dazzling canopy radiating with life. A miscellany of luminous flora and fauna is revealed across the animation, each buzzing with a unique exuberance. These animate subjects are composed by spinning coloured wires rapidly, a technique that was first seen in Choon Lin’s 2020 film trilogy pEARs ' _/_/_/_ ' in §pring. The artist is interested in how the different physicality we experience around us, even for the static and inanimate, are actually made up of countless atoms that are constantly in motion at a quantum level, vibrating and pulsing with energy at any given moment. Reimagining this quantum phenomenon of energetic vibrations, the artist experimented with swift spiralling motion of wires, capturing them on camera as nebulous entities, and subsequently reconfiguring and augmenting the images expressively into the likes of lifeforms akin to flowers, insects and plants. These illuminated subjects prance around the screen, pulsating and dancing in resonance with the periodic oscillation of the tree’s branches.
Mission Control by Joo Choon Lin, Episode 01, LIVE on YouTube 30 Nov 2020 (Full Moon day), 8pm
Mission Control is part of INTESTINOLOGY, a process of art-making and an organ of experimentation for materials to be digested and transformed, releasing and unearthing discoveries that lie beneath the surface of things. Broadly arranged in series since 2014, Mission Control is an exploration of human systems, perception, and sound phenomena using new technology and mixed media.The seed of the artist’s exploration in each episode lies in her own particular set of tools, and the methods and techniques in wielding them, informed by a certain mathematical basis or geometric structure and her inquiry into numerical systems as a bridge to enter the complexity and wonders of the invisible realm. The copper pennies—acting as conductors of electricity—on her disc-shaped clay sculptures are arranged into geometric configurations, and her 9-pad angular sculptures are inspired by the golden ratio as well as the magic square, a grid in which the numbers in the rows, columns, and diagonals all add up to the same. These sound sculptures, alongside mechanical turntables and modified digital electronics, form several of the experimental musical instruments in the artist’s expanding toolkit of sound-producing objects and techniques.The possibilities in deploying these tools evolve as the artist plays and replays her collection of sounds in a series of musical exercises in her studio. It is a process in which intuition and logic converge into one. She assigns sounds to positions in a numerical system, assembles sound pitches together based on the mathematical relationship between their visualized lines, and constructs sets of collages with sound. The compositions that emerge resemble waves and spirals that are constantly changing, freed from their original geometric forms and numerical bases, and channeled into a different dimension.One might think of the way the stalk of a morning glory twines and curls its way up a fence, as if searching for something above. Or how our breath, through a series of inhalations and exhalations, can usher in a state in which we feel at one with the cosmos. Or the strike of a bell giving way to a succession of overtones, perceptible only when we hold on, attuned to what had just come before. Its origin—the vibration of each seed, each breath, and each tone—has its own system of construction and set patterns, as one might observe under a microscope. Yet, out of these ordered patterns and sets spring unending streams of sensations and rhythms. It is this dance of possibility and state of timelessness that Choon Lin is after. In each performance, as geometry transforms into poetry, the hues, textures, and beat of these spirals unfold as she immerses herself within the vibration of life. The outcome of each episode, be it interrupted or discordant, will reverberate in subsequent performances, as echoes of a journey in a digital, expansive, indefinite domain. Mixed with NASA’s transmissions from space and archival audio tracks, the sounds spiraling from the sculptures blend with the planetary and celestial acoustic flow, composing a sonic orchestra of the universe.
Mission Control by Joo Choon Lin, Episode 02, LIVE 08 Dec 2020, 8pm
Mission Control by Joo Choon Lin will launch upon the rise of the full moon on 30 November, a trip to the beat of the cosmos and the churn of the salty seas. Live streamed on YouTube, each performance will be a discovery of the potential of materials and objects to transmit and generate sound.The seed of the artist’s exploration in each episode lies in her own particular set of tools, and the methods and techniques in wielding them, informed by a certain mathematical basis or geometric structure and her inquiry into numerical systems as a bridge to enter the complexity and wonders of the invisible realm. The copper pennies—acting as conductors of electricity—on her disc-shaped clay sculptures are arranged into geometric configurations, and her 9-pad angular sculptures are inspired by the golden ratio as well as the magic square, a grid in which the numbers in the rows, columns, and diagonals all add up to the same. These sound sculptures, alongside mechanical turntables and modified digital electronics, form several of the experimental musical instruments in the artist’s expanding toolkit of sound-producing objects and techniques.Join the live chat during the performances! Selected comments posted during the live chat will be reassembled and transposed into constellations of sounds and shapes using the 9-pad sculptures, which pairs letters of the alphabet with numbers.Live streamed on YouTube:
30 November 2020,
08 December 2020,
15 December 2020,
and there’s more to come!All episodes begin at 8pm (GMT+8) on Joo Choon Lin’s YouTube Channel.
Mission Control by Joo Choon Lin, Episode 03, LIVE 15 Dec 2020 (New Moon day), 8pm, GMT+8
Mission Control is part of INTESTINOLOGY, a process of art-making and an organ of experimentation for materials to be digested and transformed, releasing and unearthing discoveries that lie beneath the surface of things. Broadly arranged in series since 2014, Mission Control is an exploration of human systems, perception, and sound phenomena using new technology and mixed media.The seed of the artist’s exploration in each episode lies in her own particular set of tools, and the methods and techniques in wielding them, informed by a certain mathematical basis or geometric structure and her inquiry into numerical systems as a bridge to enter the complexity and wonders of the invisible realm. The copper pennies—acting as conductors of electricity—on her disc-shaped clay sculptures are arranged into geometric configurations, and her 9-pad angular sculptures are inspired by the golden ratio as well as the magic square, a grid in which the numbers in the rows, columns, and diagonals all add up to the same. These sound sculptures, alongside mechanical turntables and modified digital electronics, form several of the experimental musical instruments in the artist’s expanding toolkit of sound-producing objects and techniques.The possibilities in deploying these tools evolve as the artist plays and replays her collection of sounds in a series of musical exercises in her studio. It is a process in which intuition and logic converge into one. She assigns sounds to positions in a numerical system, assembles sound pitches together based on the mathematical relationship between their visualized lines, and constructs sets of collages with sound. The compositions that emerge resemble waves and spirals that are constantly changing, freed from their original geometric forms and numerical bases, and channeled into a different dimension.One might think of the way the stalk of a morning glory twines and curls its way up a fence, as if searching for something above. Or how our breath, through a series of inhalations and exhalations, can usher in a state in which we feel at one with the cosmos. Or the strike of a bell giving way to a succession of overtones, perceptible only when we hold on, attuned to what had just come before. Its origin—the vibration of each seed, each breath, and each tone—has its own system of construction and set patterns, as one might observe under a microscope. Yet, out of these ordered patterns and sets spring unending streams of sensations and rhythms. It is this dance of possibility and state of timelessness that Choon Lin is after. In each performance, as geometry transforms into poetry, the hues, textures, and beat of these spirals unfold as she immerses herself within the vibration of life. The outcome of each episode, be it interrupted or discordant, will reverberate in subsequent performances, as echoes of a journey in a digital, expansive, indefinite domain. Mixed with NASA’s transmissions from space and archival audio tracks, the sounds spiraling from the sculptures blend with the planetary and celestial acoustic flow, composing a sonic orchestra of the universe.
Mission Control by Joo Choon Lin, Episode 04, 2021
Public Announcement:
Mission Control is traveling to✫ klingt gut KLG 2020/21, 5th International Symposium klingt gut!, Hamburg, Germany, 12-15 May 2021✫ "Cyber Labyrinth", part of LightNight Liverpool 2021, arts festival, UK, 21 May 2021
Joo Choon Lin’s Mission Control returns with Episode 4, presented at the klingt gut! KLG 2020/21, 5th International Symposium on Sonic Art and Spatial Audio, Hamburg. Her recent investigations have cast her in the role of a sound-maker, exploring the properties of materials and crafting them into extraordinary tools to tap into the sounds that permeate and surround us, yet remain invisible to the naked ear. These are the sounds produced from phenomena as magnificent as the churning of the galaxies or as miniscule as the curve of a flower’s stem as it twines towards the sun. At the heart of Choon Lin’s inquiry lies the question of how the unseen sound reveals the forces that energize and flow throughout all parts of the universe.
For this latest production, Choon Lin continues her exploration of the spiral, researching into its historical associations with patterns and sequences and appropriating them as methods for artmaking. She draws upon numerical patterns connected to a spiral, such as the Fibonacci sequence and the Golden Ratio, using them as notations for variations and improvisations. This episode features a new segment, where the keyboard becomes an instrument to meditate on the pitch and loudness of sounds inspired by the Fibonacci sequence. Alongside the performance is a new series of videos, which centre on Choon Lin’s recent sound sculptures that reference the angles and diagrams of the Golden Ratio.As before, the work is performed by the artist, masked, gloved, and fitted in a garment, all specially designed for the performance. Printed with the symbols and patterns that float around the Mission Control set, the costume becomes a filter through which the artist appears as an element of the whole, her figure emerging and dissolving into a constellation of sounds.
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