2021

Cells

Xiang Sun

Xiang Sun

Parsons The New School for Design

Xiaotong Yang

Xiaotong Yang

Parsons The New School for Design

Ran Hu

Ran Hu

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

2021

Cells

Xiang Sun

Parsons The New School for Design

Xiaotong Yang

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

2021

Cells

Xiang Sun

Parsons The New School for Design

Xiaotong Yang

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

Cell, in biology, is the basic membrane-bound unit that contains the fundamental molecules of life and of which all living things are composed. It represents life or organism. Secondly, “cells” can also be described as a web of repetitive items, representing the overall look of the installation. Third, “cells” can be referred to as jail cells, a small locked-up room that holds people who have lost their freedom of movement. It reflects our concept of each person inside each piece of glass or each window of the digital world (Zoom, for example). Lastly, when mobile phones were invented in the 1940s, the inventors looked at the web of networks that made it work and called it the “Cell Phone,” that’s why today we refer to it as such, representing the digital aspect of our concept. DESIGN CONCEPT Voyage through this interlace and mesh of illumination. For the time being, allow your emotions to follow suit, allow your senses to explore forth, and encourage your anatomy to feel it through. The interactive experience of this piece utilizes what’s tangible to incite the intangibles, where an installation stirs every abstract notion of the human senses. In December 2019, Coronavirus put the populous and stressed world on pause. Every mundane social interaction that was once taken for granted became a restriction. Going against the nature of our kind, we found ourselves suddenly isolated, existing more profoundly in the digital world than the terrestrial. We are constantly reminded of our desires for bodily contacts, for the feelings of substance, and for the longing of a return to normalcy. The experience of this installation amplifies this confinement. Standing within, your view of the world is filtered through screens, warped, flipped, divided, and disconnected. From the other end as the world views you, you are subjected, magnified and examined in every motion, every sound. You may feel anger, frustration, or helplessness. You may concern yourself with the bigger questions of where the world is heading or how will this entrapment ever be surmounted. You then realize, you are alone, inhaling what you’d just exhaled, but you are not the only one. You are within a cell, among every other cell, isolated, but connected.

Cells