Jen Liu work can be seen in the group exhibition Outside the Palace of Heavenly Purity at bitforms gallery in New York.

outside the palace of heavenly purity

Outside the Palace of Heavenly Purity presents narratives that complicate the prevailing idea of globalization as a force emanating directly from privileged Western centers. Engaging with a variety of speculative models, these works explore the dynamics of emergent networks of power within the global landscape and its local permutations.

Jen Liu integrates live action and animation in Pink Slime Caesar Shift, a video that presents four proposals to transform the DNA of mass-produced in-vitro hamburgers into carriers of secret messages of labor insurrection on behalf of Special Economic Zone factory workers in China. By instrumentalizing the production of synthetic meat for new methods of grassroots communication, Liu follows a real-world development to its (il)logical end. The video itself acts as a message carrier, bridging the lived realities of workers and the global industrial pipeline that seeks to conceal them.

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Jen Liu, PINK SLIME CAESAR SHIFT, video.

Publication date: 12 Jun '18