Zhixing Zhang

Practice & background

Zhixing Ken Zhang works across interactive installation, moving image, photography and visual design. Language and cultural transmission are central concerns, particularly the changes that occur when a signal passes through different media and systems.

BABEL translates a sentence through multiple languages before returning to the input language. Twelve mannequin heads, speakers, servos, a microphone, projection and rice paper turn translation into an audible, visible and participatory spatial event.

Other projects include Tsang Chieh, exploring writing, power and erasure, and Ephemeral, a temporary ring of light within shared space. His biography records study at SAIC, NYU Shanghai and the University of Sydney, placing translation within a practice shaped by movement across countries.

Looking at the work

Sound, mechanical movement and participatory systems make the shifts and inventions of translation directly perceptible.