Chapter: Seeking and Searching / Life Aquatic
Installation/Gastspiel at Schafhof, Europäisches Kunstforum Oberbayern, Freising 28 September – 1 December 2024
Journeys and cognitive processes are similar to each other. In search of happiness, understanding and belonging, people have always travelled. They discover, collect and tell stories – and thus process, share and re-process that what they have experienced. For the Kirin Quest project, Yuki Jungesblut embarked on an expedition around the East China Sea to search for the mythical Kirin, a dragon-like creature that is seen as a harbinger of happiness and peace. On her journey she partly followed the routes of the diplomatic missions between Japan and Tang China which have left a legacy of cultural exchange and in part she chose flexible routes adapted to the present. The story of this expedition was originally presented as an extended photo book and is now shown at Schafhof for the first time as a hybrid installation that extends the narrative from the book into space.
With the Kirin as its leitmotif and The Hunting of the Snark by Lewis Carroll as its guide, the work invites visitors on a journey between imagination, fiction and reality that connects different worlds and times. The project weaves a web of impressions of a region, of exchange and trade, deities and rocks, nature and culture, East and West, present, past and future. The installation here focuses on the in-between and water as a mediating element.
Note: The installation was constructed in space as an open array but so that it is never visible in its entirety. It is the movement of the visitors themselves, moving in space, from island to island, station to station – seeing, reading, thinking – that connects the various impressions and trains of thought.
Additional Thanks: Carsten Hinrichs and Cheese Sana Film for lighting rescue efforts, Senat Berlin for supporting the original project, Druckwerkstatt BBK, Fotohof for publishing the book
