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Zheng Jialei (with Billie Sng)



Dialogues: The Bizarre Adventures of Traveller and Scribe: Part 1.0  (Chronicles of the South Seas); a Meta-Manuscript—Analysis of Asemantic Ideographic Scriptures/Language Processing Through The Lens of Recreational Linguistics
(2024)


Hand-bound manuscript
Ink and Graphite on Paper

Manuscript: 30 x 30 cm
Scrolls: 30 x 100 cm

The work presents the dialogues between traveller and scribe as a meta-manuscript, documenting the journey of the artist in Borneo and the creation of the artwork through diaristic entries and conversations, photo essays, and poetic analyses of ideographic scriptures. The work manifests itself as a hand-bound book alongside two scrolls acting as an abstract visual synopsis of the book. The manuscript explores ergodic literature i.e. a nontrivial effort is required for the reader to traverse the text; a text not necessarily read or understood, but experienced viscerally.
A reference to the expeditions of Admiral Zheng He in 大德南海志 (Chronicles of the South Seas) from the 11th century. The work alludes to the cultural exchange between Ancient China and Borneo, the objects of trade and how they present the people to us, before exploring its place as an artwork and of the journey itself.

The travelogue is a collaboration between Zheng Jialei and Billie Sng, with their intersecting practices and research on language and writing.





Zheng Jialei (b. Singapore, 2001) is a multidisciplinary art practitioner investigating the concerns of Chinese diaspora and the fragmentation of cultural identity. Born to immigrant parents, her sense of displacement started a journey of investigating loss and trauma through the lens of the postmemory. Zheng works primarily with asemantic calligraphy scripts, constructed language, and performance.
Billie Sng (b. Singapore, 1997) is a multidisciplinary artist, and designer whose research dissects the formal structures of language, poetics, and methods of writing. He has explored these topics through asemantic writing (without meaning), self-language modelling, self-publishing, and new media audio/video works.