Blow Bill To Death
Lightbox installation with digital print on polyester film and induction tape, variable dimensions
This work explores the linguistic creativity that emerges in China. To circumvent filters on sensitive words like “Kill” (杀), netizens began substituting the character for “Mouth” (口), inadvertently creating a more violent title for a famous movie.
Similarly, the word “Alpaca” is banned online because its pronunciation is a homophone for a vulgar phrase. I am fascinated by the absurdity of this situation—where an innocent animal becomes a digital phantom, stripped of its original meaning and burdened with a political one it never asked for. The work highlights the unintended consequences and dark humor of attempting to control language.
This piece was featured in "A Haven for Phantoms" at Egg.Space, Zürich, the final exhibition in their Intervening Spheres series.
photographs by Levi Toijia