David Boring’s Lead Singer is Hosting a Sound Installation

Description

For more than a decade, David Boring have presented their, insular anthems of alienation in communal concert rituals bordering on performance art. So it’s no huge surprise to discover that lead singer Janice Laujan is crossing into the gallery world, presenting her first sound installation and durational performance. 

Onstage, as frontwoman of Hong Kong’s premier post-punk/industrial agitators, Laujan steely gaze and horror-movie contact lenses serve as a confrontation — demanding of the audience answers to questions never stated. Memory & Punishment instead serves an invitation, welcoming guests into a self-contained shoeless environment where every participant becomes a living sculpture, subsumed in an alien world of sound and light — much like a David Boring concert.

In this case however, visitors are more likely to lie down than mosh, while the immersive sonic arch is by sound artist Jonathan Yang. Touching on themes familiar from the band’s elliptical lyrics, the installation offers a third space, between home and work, for memories to surface and feelings of shame, grief and trauma to be processed. “There aren’t many places in this city where you’re allowed to just be with something difficult — no fixing it, no moving on from it,” says the artist. “I wanted to build a room freed from polite boundaries that could hold that instead.”

Watch out for special “guest engineer” sections, featuring artists including rapper Gold Mountain and Karen Yu, artistic director of Contemporary Musiking Hong Kong and an associate musician of the Hong Kong New Music Ensemble.

As well as single-entry tickets (HK$50), a multi-entry pass for HK$80 includes a pair of funky, purple branded socks. Mid-way through the exhibition’s run, on 13 September, David Boring will take a break from an ongoing regional tour to perform in the space, with limited tickets on sale from 22 August.