We Are All Caged" 2002

Visual and sound installation
Mixed media 300 cm x 480 cm x 600 cm x 240 cm

Sound text: Shanglie Zhou
Sound recording & editing: Alex Otterlei
Man voice: Peter T'sas
Woman voice: Tanja Reynaerts

An art project ”Combinaison” at het Fort Napoleon in Oostende, 2002




We are all caged
sound-installation

W: Corporeality

M: Body modulation

W: Act for me.

M: Play for me.

W: You want to design my body?

M: I am only trying to make you happy.

W: I was in love last night.

M: We flushed it away this morning.


W: I can’t breathe.

W: Don’t change me!

M: Don’t force me!

W: Do you still love me?

M: I lost my virginity.

W: Something is not right.

M: I love that forbidden line.

W: I don’t belong... release me!

M: We have to fit in it.

W: I am in pain.

M: I don’t have a choice.

W: I can’t stand it.

M: We have to tolerant.

W: Could you open it for me?

M: There is no way out.

W: I don’t feel comfortable.

M: I am still naked.

W: Is there anyone free?

M: Who is free and who is a prisoner?

W: I am chained by fears.

M: Kill your five senses.

W: I have to pose.

M: I am locked.


W: I am abused

W: I am somebody else.

M: I am innocent.

W: Why do you present me as such...?

M: Try to be real!

W: I have been used.

M: A reanimated dead body.

W: We are only products.

M: I have been preserved.

W: Life is not fair.

M: What have we missed.

W: I am a liar.

M: We are betrayed.

W: Oh, I am so sick of everybody.

M: It is not fair.

W: Who is playing with me?

M: Who is playing?

W: I love this game.

M: Who am I?

W: Why do you choose me?

M: We are only dust.

W: Leave me alone!


W: I am displaced.

W: Is this a printed world?

M: Travesty of justice.

W: Do you find any entrance?

M: Does it exist?

W: Are you a human?

M: An artificial one.

W: Why are you here?

M: To be a body-building.

W: I want to have first-hand experience.

M: Superimposed.

W: Give me some space.

M: Moved certainty.

W: Are we connected?

M: We never know the distance.

W: Being together?

M: We are dislocated.

W: Are we so different?

M: We are only humans.

W: I can’t find borders.

M: Where are we going?

W: Do you want to reshape your social body?

M: Another artificial recreation?

W: Where is my original body?

M: I don’t have one.

W: Should we polish the landscape?

M: The constructions between fiction and reality?

W: Transformed nature.

M: Disembodying power.

W: Dance with me!

M: Physically or politically?

W: A world at play.

M: Gain lost.


W: I feel so lonely.

W: Do you believe in me?

M: No, we don’t believe in anyone.

W: Do you understand me?

M: What kind of language do you speak?

W: Why do you love me?

M: Do you hate me?

W: It is so dark here.

M: Walls, walls and walls...

W: Feel me, feel me, feel me...

M: I can’t move.

W: Am I beautiful?

M: Do I still have my identity?

W: I am a shadow of myself.

M: I really feel good today.

W: Is there any stranger outside?

M: Why don’t you accept me?

W: Is there any sky?

M: Where is the air?

W: I am a prisoner of my nature.

M: We are still prisoners in the history box.

W: I wish I were never locked.

M: We are locked by ourselves.

W: The darkness is inside me.

M: Open our wounds!

W: I am crossing my inner field.

M: There is no window of our souls.

W: What are we fighting for?

M: A skin of wall.

W: How do we remove our personal walls?

M: I have got a devil in my heart.

W: Speak to me!

M: Do you really want to understand me?


W: I feel so empty.

W: I lost my dreams.

M: I am nowhere.

W: No one is legal.

M: I am only a passager.

W: Should we make easy fun?

M: Do you feel safe?

W: My brains are polluted.

M: Internal chaos.

W: I lost my visual vocabulary.

M: I am a self-stranger.

W: Where is the sun?

M: Is the moon still there?

W: Have you ever had a sweet dream?

M: Give me the chance.

W: Should I still hope?

M: The future is passed.

W: I lost myself.

M: Shadow to shadow.

W: An absence of the time.

M: A fabricated reality.

W: I am so confused.

M: Everything is meaningless.

W: Touch me, touch me, touch me...

M: I am fading...

W: What is the truth?

M: Truth is a mirage.

W: I am so fragile.

M: I have been fixed.

W: Is it the west wind?

M: A cloud of sound.

W: Who are you?

M: I lost my memory.

W: Is this a life station?

M: We always return.

W: Do I have a future?

M: I feel so disoriented.

W: Trading destinations.

M: A dishonored honor.

W: How many times do people die?

M: We all have to die.

W: I was a child again.

M: His birth is useless.


M: I am still fading...