Artista: Oni Wong
Opera: H2O (2001)
Bio: Oni Wong comes from the Neapolitan Punk-underground movement, to whose contesting expression she mingles the provocative and subversive one of the feminine aesthetics. Her artistic activity is focused on a variety of techniques, from installation and performance to sculpture, ceramics and painting, originated and processed in independence and autonomy from the art-establishment of museums and galleries. Wong’s art is born in the 80s, when the artist takes part in alternative cultural events and manifestations in Naples, such as the occupation of the “Tienamment”, an autonomous space for art and culture.
Oni Wong’s artistic research is intimately linked on the organic idea of life and identity, be it biological, personal, cultural and artistic, as a perpetual flux of decomposition and transformation. Indicative is the artist’s habit of changing periodically her names; she was Titania, Zizzania, Fosca, Ognissanti, and at the moment Oni Wong, each name identifiable with a specific artistic phase. She has collaborated with noumerous experimental art laboratories and independent galleries and art spaces in Naples, such as Studio Aperto Multimediale, Laboratorio 3c, Dissociazione Culturale, Cielo celeste Emporio Spirituale; as well as with art group such as Eretici Sfrattati, Gruppo Area, Sex and Violence; and with the cyber-punk group Contropotere. Among her international experiences, central is her participation in the multicultural art biennial “Berlinapoli”, founded by the “Street Univercity” by Giò Di Sera in Berlin.
Artwork: H2O (2001) – installation H2O “The installation is a reflection on the relationship between necessity, dependence and lack, decay, starting from the natural element of water, and its peculiarity of being of primary necessity but of precarious, because extinguishable, existence. I have reflected on the eventuality of the water’s existence. Evaporating water releases mineral salts, that which remains of its disappearance. For this installation I used ten kilos of common cooking salt and put them on the floor, around a picture of my face with my mouth wide open, as in urgency of water. The disk-like shape formed by the picture surrounded with salt was illuminated by a powerful headlight, in order to simulate the heat of the sun. Other two, less potent, headlights were used to light up the lateral pieces of the installation, one consisting of a fish lying on a white cotton sheet put on a heap of earth, the other a pillow lettuce on which I put a bowl with some river water where, during the show, a prawn and an alga were born. This was a birth I strongly wished for. Part of the installation was a text I distributed to the public, which I wrote inspired by water and its essence and properties and also to water as both property and gift.”
H2O - text
Water is a liquid substance, it is odourless, tasteless, it solidifies with cold and vaporizes with heat Sea, river, lake Seen from a far distance, the earth is white and blue Earth=planet of the water. 72% of earth surface is water Water is a renewable yet exhaustible good Washing, cleaning, agriculture, industry Acid rain, greenhouse effect, melting ices 50 litres of water per day for each human being 400 litres of water per capita for public and industrial use Ammonia-phosphates-nitrates= chemical pollution Bacterium coli= fecal pollution Desertification-it does not rain-being thirsty-sterility-sand Water colour-living water-waters of faith science pity-territorial waters Moods of the animal body-leaking-orine-1/1,5 litres per day is expelled from each human being, for an amount of 39,000 litres in a life Water=site where life originates, develops and evolves, necessarily Water of the soul-break waters Water is 53% of the male body weight-45% of the female one Cerebrospinal-pleural-peritoneal-synovial liquid Digestive secretions 9 litres Mood tear-tears-1cl of tears Saliva 1 litre per day=27000 litres in a life Sweat 20/50 cl per day, 18000/20000 litres in a life Faeces 54 kilos in a year, 4 tons in a whole life Water in the blood is 83%-in the bones 22%-in the brain 74%-in the adipose tissue 10% Thirst-hypothalamus-dehydration-overhydration-shipwrecks-sponge-vomit Sweet water-water breaded-brackish water-holy water-thermal water-sulphurous water-high water-against water-wash more waters-body of water-baptismal water-reverse water-potable water-h2o-lime water-water odour-ferrous water-turpentine-aqua regia-heavy water-water of life-water Nanfitò-water tofana-tanning water Getting older, the human body tends to dehydrate Desert-abandoned-lonely-uninhabited-uncultivated-sterile country Drying-draining-corpse. Contacts: Studio d’arte: via Nilo, 34, Napoli https://www.facebook.com/oni.wong.3?fref=tsArtworks
