In the context of the pandemic, political and social tensions became increasingly visible, exposing structural inequalities shaped by class relations and experiences of discrimination. Emerging from a critical reflection on the limits of human empathy, the video work “I understand” challenges the widespread assumption that realities other than one’s own can simply be understood or fully inhabited through acts of imagination.
Amid the Black Lives Matter movement, public gatherings – including those in Berlin – became spaces of collective resistance and of reflecting on one’s own position within social power structures. For Jingban, who arrived in Berlin in spring 2020 through an artist residency, these moments condense ongoing questions of proximity and distance, as well as the responsibility to stand for experiences that resist easy understanding.
Hao Jingban is an artist based in Beijing. Her practice unfolds through long-term research, interweaving archival materials, historical inquiry, and lived experience. She examines how images shape collective memory and how subjectivity is articulated within social and structural conditions.
Dates
Credits
Part of “Being Alone - Artistic Perspectives from Central and East Asia and Beyond“, a project within “Solitude: Loneliness & Freedom,” an initiative of the Goethe-Institutes in East and Central Asia in cooperation with HAU Hebbel am Ufer. Curatorial contribution by Jenny Jiaying Chen. Courtesy of the artist and Blindspot Gallery. Thanks to Su Wei, Jiang Meng and Qu Chang.
Location
HAU2
Hallesches Ufer 34, 10963 BerlinThere are two marked parking spots in front of the building. Barrier-free restroom facilities are available. Four relaxed seats are available in the first row of HAU2.
