1 00:00:01,580 --> 00:00:03,880 [MACHINE HUMMING SOUNDS] 2 00:00:14,960 --> 00:00:18,880 I kind of enjoy being in that stage of perpetual confusion, 3 00:00:20,560 --> 00:00:24,360 not being completely at place with one category 4 00:00:25,100 --> 00:00:27,980 and being completely comfortable in that flux. 5 00:00:39,240 --> 00:00:42,260 ["Jes Fan In Flux"] 6 00:00:50,260 --> 00:00:53,360 [Urban Glass, Brooklyn] 7 00:00:56,520 --> 00:00:57,700 [Jes Fan, artist] 8 00:00:57,700 --> 00:01:00,740 While I was in school in the RISD glass program, 9 00:01:00,740 --> 00:01:05,480 learning how this matter transformed itself from one state into another 10 00:01:05,480 --> 00:01:10,400 really entranced me into thinking, "How I can I apply it to other mediums?" 11 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:15,840 --You have to move so quick because the material is alive. 12 00:01:17,900 --> 00:01:19,960 --It was liquid, now it's almost plastic 13 00:01:19,960 --> 00:01:24,360 -- and then it'll become more like what we think of what glass is. 14 00:01:26,920 --> 00:01:28,660 My work comes from two experiences. 15 00:01:29,620 --> 00:01:30,340 --Blow. 16 00:01:32,020 --> 00:01:39,580 One is moving from Hong Kong, where I was considered as a majority. 17 00:01:39,580 --> 00:01:43,420 And then moving to the U.S. where I was suddenly considered as a minority. 18 00:01:44,840 --> 00:01:47,760 And another one is growing up being queer. 19 00:01:49,640 --> 00:01:51,620 Being queer in Hong Kong is very hard. 20 00:01:52,440 --> 00:01:55,320 You can't find yourself represented. 21 00:01:55,660 --> 00:01:58,900 When you can't see yourself in the mirror, you think you're a ghost. 22 00:02:01,520 --> 00:02:04,820 I'm really curious as to how substances get imbued 23 00:02:04,820 --> 00:02:08,810 with these really political identity categories, 24 00:02:08,810 --> 00:02:14,180 and how there is also constantly a biological affiliation to race. 25 00:02:15,420 --> 00:02:21,120 So I started making sculptures extending to biological mediums-- 26 00:02:22,180 --> 00:02:25,580 things that are imbued with identity categories-- 27 00:02:25,580 --> 00:02:27,000 specifically testosterone, 28 00:02:27,420 --> 00:02:28,880 and also estrogen, 29 00:02:28,880 --> 00:02:30,400 but also melanin. 30 00:02:32,120 --> 00:02:35,239 In one of the projects I did called "Mother is a Women," 31 00:02:35,240 --> 00:02:37,720 I asked my mom for her urine samples. 32 00:02:38,160 --> 00:02:43,820 There is nothing weirder than holding your mom's excretions in your hand 33 00:02:43,820 --> 00:02:46,000 trying to cross U.S. customs. 34 00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:46,920 [LAUGHS] 35 00:02:47,720 --> 00:02:48,920 It's so weird. 36 00:02:50,120 --> 00:02:54,740 Then I worked with a lab and extracted estrogen out of the sample, 37 00:02:54,740 --> 00:02:56,520 and created a beauty cream out of it. 38 00:02:57,080 --> 00:02:59,699 [VIDEO VOICE OVER] --The purest estrogen from my mother's urine... 39 00:02:59,699 --> 00:03:05,180 [FAN] In this age where substances that sustain identity categories 40 00:03:05,180 --> 00:03:08,719 can be bought, and sold, and made, and commissioned, 41 00:03:08,720 --> 00:03:12,840 how am I, as a vessel of these identities, exist? 42 00:03:16,660 --> 00:03:19,880 [Chinatown] 43 00:03:20,880 --> 00:03:26,860 I started playing with these substances when a lot of friends around me started transitioning. 44 00:03:29,500 --> 00:03:31,620 And also I started transitioning. 45 00:03:36,300 --> 00:03:40,099 Using testosterone to masculinize my body 46 00:03:40,100 --> 00:03:45,580 is in some way similar to using a chisel to carve out a surface. 47 00:03:47,080 --> 00:03:49,040 In a way, you're sculpting your body. 48 00:03:49,040 --> 00:03:51,579 And in a way, I'm also like that glass, 49 00:03:51,580 --> 00:03:53,380 in this liquid transformation, 50 00:03:53,380 --> 00:03:55,240 or perpetually in flux. 51 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:03,300 It's almost like watching Discovery Channel. 52 00:04:06,500 --> 00:04:07,900 You learn codes 53 00:04:07,900 --> 00:04:11,360 that you weren't brought up leaning 54 00:04:12,560 --> 00:04:14,640 and you have to unlearn a lot. 55 00:04:16,200 --> 00:04:18,180 It's not always comfortable. 56 00:04:30,580 --> 00:04:33,880 [Recess, Brooklyn] 57 00:04:40,760 --> 00:04:44,480 Right now, I'm working on a series of sculptures called "Systems." 58 00:04:46,360 --> 00:04:50,960 They are all this lattice pattern 59 00:04:50,960 --> 00:04:53,840 with these glass globules hanging on them. 60 00:04:56,540 --> 00:05:01,620 These glass globules in turn become containers for these biological substances. 61 00:05:05,120 --> 00:05:08,860 I pour silicone inside the vessel. 62 00:05:09,720 --> 00:05:11,940 Then I inject melanin, 63 00:05:12,920 --> 00:05:13,940 testosterone, 64 00:05:14,300 --> 00:05:15,580 and also estrogen, 65 00:05:16,060 --> 00:05:16,960 and also fat. 66 00:05:22,240 --> 00:05:23,780 Playing with these substances, 67 00:05:23,780 --> 00:05:27,960 I want to see it detached from the body and existing on its own. 68 00:05:28,420 --> 00:05:30,500 Once they're removed from the body, 69 00:05:30,500 --> 00:05:34,000 the sight of identification, like, "What are they?" 70 00:05:51,000 --> 00:05:53,840 It's really interesting how animate these materials are, 71 00:05:54,420 --> 00:05:57,440 not behaving in a way that you would expect it to. 72 00:05:59,060 --> 00:06:02,400 There's a material expansion that wants to push the shells. 73 00:06:03,280 --> 00:06:05,280 And sometimes it just implodes. 74 00:06:09,960 --> 00:06:12,000 Holding the melanin in my hands, 75 00:06:12,009 --> 00:06:14,060 or holding the hormones in my hands-- 76 00:06:14,060 --> 00:06:16,460 such contested political substance-- 77 00:06:16,460 --> 00:06:18,300 there's some absurdity in it. 78 00:06:21,140 --> 00:06:24,700 How banal are these little flecks of powders? 79 00:06:27,920 --> 00:06:30,040 This is ultimately the most absurd. 80 00:06:33,260 --> 00:06:38,080 Maybe it is triggering the similar experiences of being racialized, 81 00:06:38,080 --> 00:06:39,620 or being gendered. 82 00:06:41,280 --> 00:06:44,320 It's just the disposition that you're constantly placed in-- 83 00:06:45,020 --> 00:06:47,080 a constant act of othering. 84 00:06:48,960 --> 00:06:53,480 But, how can we be so absolutely certain that the binary can satisfy us?