Runqiu Peng in Conversation with Multimedia Artist Rong Bao

Rong Bao is a multimedia artist currently studying at the Royal College of Art, Sculpture, MA. With her rebellious character, Bao’s art expresses a sense of deviance, and her work's “misplacement” makes the impossible possible. Although the repetitiveness in some of her works delivers a sense of despair to futile human endeavours, she holds a positive attitude towards life as she is the “little sun” to those around her.

While coming from Chinese cultural background, Bao has travelled around the world, and her artistic language is general and universal. She invites people to participate in her work and be surprised by the humour involved in it.

Rong Bao.

Runqiu Peng: Can you tell us a little bit about your artistic upbringing?

Rong Bao: To others, I was one of those successful kids. I went to the best school in Beijing, China, and even the world, from kindergarten to graduate studies. But in the third year of my undergraduate degree, I chose to drop out of the China Academy of Art (CAA) and transferred to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

My parents were very encouraging and respectful of my ideas and judgments and never interfered much with my choices. This was at odds with the current Chinese educational model, which cultivates a unified examination-based curriculum.

After entering CAA, I realised that the training and selection process of the Chinese art education system was less focused on the exploration of individual languages and lacked the critical spirit of contemporary practice. This was the time when Contemporary art rescued me. I suddenly saw that someone could put a moustache on Mona Lisa's mouth and a urinal could enter an exhibition hall. I realised there could be such a reckless and wild way of expression in the world, so deviant and yet still acceptable. Contemporary art was my salvation from that dark time. It was the only outlet I could find for my reluctance to conform to the world's rules.

The Enigma, 2023. PVC fabric and tube, 350 x 330 x 400 cm. London, UK.

RP: There are many “misplacements” in your works, where things are turned upside down, the soft becomes hard, and black becomes white. Your work, Strike (2020), is a typical example. Can you tell us a little bit more about this work?

RB: The inspiration for this work came from the huge bell-ringing hammers of Buddhist temples, which I replaced with a soft material made of cotton and fibre. I turned the original hard, big logs into a 2-metre-long cylinder made of sacking suspended in mid-air by two chains, half-bent and dangling like a weak male sexual organ. I placed a recording button at one end of the soft bell hammer to record the sound of the temple bell. When the audience strikes the limp hammer against the wall, the recording button emits the original recorded bell sound.

This is a work that requires the audience to participate in its completion, as the bell does not make a sound when it is suspended in the air, and is only completed when the audience strikes the huge bell against the wall again and again, as if wielding a huge sexual organ, and is amazed by the sound of the bells as they hit the wall (reminiscent of having sex). I consider the audience's participation, reaction and experience to be part of my work. By subverting the original function of everyday objects and placing them in different contexts, my work visualises a rebellion against the microscopic forces of the present through an exaggerated sense of strangeness.

Strike, 2020. Metal chain, burlap fibre, red silk, cotton, sound talking button, 75 x 11 x 11 inch. Chicago, U.S.

RP: Is this pursuit of “misplacement” also a reflection of your rebellious personal character?

RB: Yes, I don't really want to be obedient. Many people have asked me why I do my work, and I feel like I get stuck on answering that every time. I have this habit that when someone tells me something, my first reaction is to argue against it. My kind of rebellion is not to inspire people to take up guns and rise in the streets. Instead, it is powerful but soft, cheerful and joyful. The biggest difference of my rebellion is probably the self-sarcasm, helplessness and humour I bring.

Good Luck, 2022. Wood, arduino, speaker, 200 x 200 x 40 cm. London, UK.

RP: There are a lot of Chinese characters in your works with elements such as bells, wells and thresholds, but at the same time, your art is very universal in its expression. How do you balance these two styles?

RB: I personally dislike works that have very personal narratives, like talking about ‘things that my grandmother gave me when I was a kid’ or ‘my childhood trauma caused by someone bullying me when I was 13’ and so on. I think the biggest difference between a work of art and a text is that you should convey the message through visual language. I like something more general and universal because it crosses the barrier between people and resonates with more audiences.

At the same time, I grew up in a Chinese cultural context, and I don't want to avoid that deliberately. Everyone has different growth paths and cultural attributes; Chinese civilisation is my underpinning. I want to make art in more universal and abstract ways by using what is unique to me.

Algae Well Cover, made in 2020, minted in 2023. NFT, contract address: 0x495f947276749Ce646f68AC8c248420045cb7b5e. Opensea.

RP: In your works Infinite Circumnavigation (2017/23) and Futile Ascent (2023), I feel a sense of desperation and repeated trial and error. Does this reflect your pessimistic attitude towards life?

RB: I hadn't really thought about it, but there is always an element of repetition in my work, and it took me a few pieces before I found my pattern. I was really interested in this kind of constant walking in circles. I'm not pessimistic about the direction of human society and history as a whole, but I sometimes feel helpless about my current living environment and conditions. People around me say I feel like having inexhaustible energy every day, like a little sun.

Infinite Circumnavigation, Footage shooting-2017, video editing-2023. Video length: 2 min 53 sec. London, UK.

Futile Ascent, 2023. Metal machine, paper box, glass, 150 x 50 x 100 cm. London, UK.

RP: Another important theme in your work is the exploration of “thresholds”. An iconic work is An Apple in 30 Meters Underwater (2017). Can you tell us more about this work?

RB: The inspiration for this piece came when I was taking my AOW (Advanced Open Water) diver’s test. My instructor brought a raw egg and a tomato underwater to thirty metres, and he cracked the egg in front of me. Due to the pressure of the water, the egg didn't break but floated in the water as a whole. That was the coolest egg I've ever seen. The tomatoes also turned to a bizarre blue-green colour. This is something you learn when you do your diving certification: the spectrum is absorbed, and the red light disappears when you dive downwards. This was my inspiration.

An Apple in 30 Meters Underwater, 2017. Apple, video length: 1 min 21 sec. Okinawa, Japan.

There is a limit to how deep a diver can dive, and the depth of 30M represents a limit that artificially separates the so-called safe zone from the non-safe zone. Beyond this depth, the water pressure is too high, and people's lives are at risk. As the water depth changes, the apple will no longer be the bright red colour seen on land but will gradually fade away with depth, as if a living body on land has fallen into the deep sea and gradually lost its colour of life. The colour red represents blood, life and desire, and the apple is the forbidden fruit of Adam and Eve.

The apple dies as it falls into the depths, reflecting the powerlessness of human life. Beyond 30 metres is the beginning of death. But what is also interesting is that the apple does not change suddenly at the moment when it exceeds 30M, but gradually fades. This so-called safe depth is also a boundary set by human society. The 30M threshold does not exist in itself but is only defined by human beings.

RP: Do you think any artists have a significant influence on you?

RB: I actually don't really like the idea that there are artists whose works have influenced me. Within my view of art, my value is to be different from what other people are doing. So I feel that looking at other people’s works is actually a kind of exclusion for me. I know I will never do it again if someone has done it before.

Hi~~~, 2023. Wood, arduino, plastic toys, 40 x 60 x 45 cm. London, UK.

RP: How would you describe your art?

RB: It seems to me that the core operating rule of Contemporary art is to break down previous definitions of art and widen its borders. Each person is unique, and each person can push the width of the world and the boundaries of civilisation out a little by stretching their perception of the world to its limits.

If you ask me why I do my work, the most honest answer I can give, and it might disappoint everyone, is that I do it because I instinctively find it fun to do so, that's all. It's fun to sink unsinkable apples, it's fun to make rocks fly up into the sky, it's fun to keep people stuck in place and doing leg lifts, it's fun to build a useless transport machine, and it's fun to watch a woman doing her morning exercise. I want to tease the world with my humour, but I also want people to be part of my work and feel surprised by the experience my work gives.

Thanks to Rong Bao on behalf of MADE IN BED. To learn more about Rong Bao, follow her on Instagram.

All images and videos are courtesy of the artist.

The interview was conducted in Chinese and later translated into English.

Runqiu Peng

Interviews Co-Editor, MADE IN BED