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2022
Tree Chuang
Designed by Xinan Ran
Project Site: Beam Project GI, Summer 2022
Tree Chuang is a series of six site-specific textile sculptures designed by Xinan Ran and built by NYC youth at Beam Camp City. Using the form of a traditional Chinese chuang — a cylindrical textile ritual apparatus commonly used in Buddhism — as a launching point, the works are both created collaboratively and showcase the unique personal narratives of Beam’s young people. Tree Chuang reimagines the religious object of a chuang into a secular, haptic and visual experience, yet retains the original’s propensity for introspection and reflection. The collection of sculptures created a multifaceted sensorial experience spread across Governors Island during summer 2022.
Project Processes + Techniques
During the creation of Tree Chuang, Beam Camp City campers and youth staff came to Governors Island to:
Embroider a map of the commute from home to their favorite place in the city
Create cyanotype portraits of their peers
Make their own “ransom advice” squares, using stamps and heat transfer vinyl to create letters
Compose unique soundtracks for each chuang, filled with the voices of campers and staff
Complete each chuang using camper-created textile art
“Tree Chuang brings the viewer a visual feast of color, information and material, while also providing them a new experience of looking inwards—while looking up to the sky. Able to be viewed by the audience from both the outside and the inside, each structure serves as a metaphor for the duality of internal psychic space and external social space that we simultaneously inhabit as we navigate the world.”
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Listen to the stories of young people who helped create Tree Chuang:
Created by:
Beam Camp City Adult Staff and Beam Camp City Youth Staff
Credit: Stefany Lazar
Created by students from:
Beam Camp City Youth Staff + Essex Academy
Credit: Stefany Lazar
Created by students from:
Bronx International HS, Brooklyn International HS, + Brooklyn Frontiers HS
Created by students from:
Bronx International HS, Manhattan International HS, International HS at Prospect Heights, + Younger Youth from Park West and Brooklyn STEAM Center
Credit: Stefany Lazar
Created by students from:
Bronx International HS, International HS for Health Sciences, + Younger Youth from Park West and Brooklyn STEAM Center
Credit: Stefany Lazar
Created by students from:
Bronx International HS + Younger Youth from Park West and Brooklyn STEAM Center
Credit: Stefany Lazar
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About the Artist, Xinan Ran
Xinan (Helen) Ran was born in Yakeshi, China and lives in Brooklyn, New York. She is a Hunter College MFA candidate and received her BFA from Pratt Institute (2017). Apart from her studio practices, Ran is an art educator and an aspirational set designer for new theaters.
In her material exploration of the painting medium, Ran is unlearning her worship towards “art supplies”. She started to explore links between habit and ritual in municipal life that are reshaped by small-scale manufacturing. Ran searches for a switch to turn on metaphors of everyday life - and shine new light - pointed at “tools” as the means of cultural production and as allegory. Ran then asks for changes that could be made after the communal discoveries. Her work spills over from the discussion of the art work to a sharing of language, space and skills — memories, experiences and emotions.
Project Team
Tree Chuang was made by a collaborative team that included the artist, Xinan Ran, Beam Center staff and Production Assistants, Beam Camp City youth staff, and Beam Camp City campers from across New York City. Thank you to the following young people for their hard work on this project.
Thank you Materials for the Arts and TwelveNYC for the material donations and to TwelveNYC for generously providing all of our Beam Camp City summer 2022 swag.
Project Production Team:
Angel, Angel, Devon, Ethan, Grizzy, Kayla, Lombe, Ugochi
Programming Team:
Adiel, Allan, Andres, Andrii, Angel, Anthony, Biana, Carme, Daimar, Isi, Jaden, Joshuan, Julia, Kaden, Kaitlyn, Lahisha, Lauren, Leandra, Sabrina, Schnaika, Sounecha
Counselors:
Brandon, Cindy, Cinthya, Dejalise, Delmi, Denisha, Henry, Howard, Ian, Jayden, Joasmide, Joseph, Kamani, Melinda, Moubarak, Nelson, Noel, Pharana, Sara, Tyler
Documentation Team:
Devon, Endy, Ridima, Salina, Sherlyn, and Vinny