A woman is painting her nails. Slowly, the camera turns to the right, away from her. Jerkily, as though missing something, the image starts moving. Someone looks around. We look around too, and see the surroundings. It seems to be a restaurant, perhaps somewhere in Asia. People are sitting at tables, eating and drinking. Someone enters the room. He is obviously hot. Is he the cook? And again the camera turns to the right with the same jerky movement. The images speed up rhythmically, the screen becomes more dense and the images seem to shoot past the eyes, then slow down again, hesitantly and jerkily, and the eyes have more time to look around. Sometimes a scene will continue for a moment, but each time the image returns to the same location and again the camera keeps turning, past a wedding banquet and a table with majong players, past people eating: is it a restaurant after all? The images do not seem to be in sequence or to belong to the same time. And although a 'story' is being strung together, we seem to be watching snatches of different tableaux being played out over the course of time. The scarcity of the previous years is being mixed with the abundance of the modern consumer society. The colours and music add to this impression: the colours are bright and strikingly present, as is the laughter which is incorporated into the music. Both seem to be an unnatural part of something that at first sight looks so pleasant.
– Carla Hoekendijk
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Ersan Wu ° 1972, Beijing (China)
Lives and works in Beijing (China)
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