Ivan Cheng, NP

NP is a performance-exhibition by Australian born, Amsterdam-based artist Ivan Cheng which presents video and installation as a setting for three new performances. Using historical and contemporary performance conventions, Cheng invites the audience to be conscious of the acts of reading and interpreting. The role of memory – human and machinic – and the accumulation and caching of information underpins Cheng’s process.

In the creation of NP, Cheng responds to the context of MUMA as a museum within an education setting. The performances, which stage new and existing texts by Cheng, were developed with Year 11 visual arts students from Melbourne’s Victorian College of the Arts Secondary School. Following a period of postal correspondence, Cheng and the student collaborators undertook a development intensive, unpacking a series of ‘gifts’ from guest artists which intervened in the production of costumes and scenography. The title of the project, NP, is an abbreviation for ‘no problem’, ‘no place’ and ‘North Pole’, alluding to Santa Claus, gift economies and wish fulfillment.

The exhibition presents a selection of Cheng’s video which focus on the edit as a methodology, and which invite the audience to find resonances between the works. The videos reflect the development of Cheng’s vernacular across different contexts and conditions. Cheng approaches video as a form of entertainment and engagement rather than a faithful document of live performance.

NP draws an association between the USB (Universal Serial Bus) and the vehicular bus, which condense and transport data or groups of people respectively. The bus as it appears in NP indicates the compressed public, distinct from individual car travel or the network model of the internet. Buses and USBs appear on top of line-following robots and as a toy model referencing Jean Prouvé’s prefabricated colonial houses. Garments from past performances are presented alongside costumes by the student collaborators and Christmas decorations loaned from their families. The installation also reuses elements of previous MUMA exhibitions as scenography. In these ways, Cheng transforms MUMA into a fantasy of the North Pole as a site of production which questions the role of the authority figure.

Part 1: My Orientation (ACCELERATIONAL FABULOUS)
Tuesday 17 September, 4pm

Part 2: My Showcase (WORLD WIPE)
Thursday 19 September, 6pm

Part 3: My Turnover (DASTARD INTRANSIGENTS)
Saturday 21 September, 4pm

Confidences/Production, the fourth book in Cheng’s Confidences series of novels about vampires and theatre is co-published by MUMA and After 8 Books Paris on the occasion of the exhibition. Available here.

About the artist

Ivan Cheng was born in Sydney and lives in Amsterdam. He completed a Bachelor of Music (performance) from the Sydney Conservatorium of Music and further study at the Royal Academy of Music, London. Cheng holds a Master in Fine Arts in Critical Studies from the Sandberg Instituut. In 2017 he initiated the project space bologna.cc in Amsterdam.

Cheng’s most recent solo exhibitions include: Milieu at Édouard Montassut, Paris and Parataxis at OoO, Vienna. His performances, works and writings have been recently presented at Hartwig Art Foundation, Amsterdam; Lafayette Anticipations, Paris; Villa Imperiale, Pesaro; FRAC des Pays de la Loire, Nantes; OCTO, Marseille; and gta Exhibitions, Zurich.

Access information

Physical access: MUMA is a ground-floor, wheelchair-accessible gallery with accessible and all-gender bathrooms. Gallery spaces are well lit and on a level surface. Contact us for a parking map or further information.
What to expect: Videos with sound, sculptural installations with moving parts and live performance.
Visually described tours: Get in touch by email to muma@monash.edu or phone 03 9905 4217 to make an appointment for a visually described tour (for blind or low vision visitors).

Acknowledgements:

MUMA wishes to acknowledge the partnership of the Victorian College of the Arts Secondary School.

NP was supported by SensiLab and MUMA Contemporaries.

^{Image: Ivan Cheng, Oil Rig Elision (tempesta d'amore), Against Sun and Dust, Villa Imperiale, Pesaro, 2023. Garments: Good & Bad. Curator: Niccolò Gravina. Produced by INCURVA. Courtesy the Artist and Edouard Montassut, Paris. Camera: No Text Azienda}