Discommunicativeness

Leon Lim MS
www.2studio.com



Abstract:
Without a word, icon or number to describe something, the world where people live in would be confusing or misled. As a person who is profoundly deaf since birth, Leon Lim, the artist didn’t see any word to understand or to scare when he was young. But he was misled and confused through his childhood years. In Asian sociological cultures, deaf or deafness is a form of punishment made by God, while it is believed to be a special gift made by God that every parent should accept.

Deafness or a person who is deaf in the sound world brings various interpretative perspectives of sound culture or hearing sound. “Hearing” is a person who can hear. Deaf culture and Hearing culture have been an unhealthy affiliation.

For the show, Discommunicativeness, the artist’s experience to the real world is as important as the uniqueness of the communication and artwork. Together the past, the present and the future of deaf people’s experiences present a point of view from which to search for a possible position in the art world as well as the sound world.

Ranging from sound/hearing cultures to deaf cultures to modern metropolises, the show has been characterized by a mix of dialogues that include alienation, oppression, contravention, and perfection.


Short project description:
The show has no sound or music. When viewers stand in the show and play a mouse to see various dialogues from deaf people’s experiences, viewers will feel the experience like a viewer is deaf in the sound world. Viewers receive unhealthy responses and impacts. Deaf people have no chance to do what viewers do.


Artist Bio:
Leon Lim is an artist and photographer based in New York City. Lim’s deafness has developed his ability to have a strong visual sense. As a child, Lim discovered colorful prints covered on music cassettes which brought him into the art world. Lim’s works ranging from painting and sculpture to interior architecture, and graphic design to multimedia and art installations and photography. As the solo voyager, who has traveled to more than 35 countries worldwide, he often explores themes of heritage preservation, social segregation, mortality, interactive communication, and the politics of identity and culture. His works merge realism with the beauty of abstract form, resulting in art that is both ancient and contemporary. Lim was born and raised in Kedah, Malaysia and schooled in Penang, Malaysia. He is a 2005 graduate of from RIT’s College of Imaging Arts and Science and will study Master of Interactive Telecommunication at New York University next year.