Becoming Relations: Performative Representation as a Form of Resistance
This project puts forward the mobilization of representation as the tool for the Chinese government to reshape the socio-ecological form that is distinct from Tibetan pastoralism in the Zoige Plateau. Zoige is always represented by ‘others’, from the shared water source for surrounding tribes to the reconceptualisation of 'wasteland', 'resources' and 'carbon pool' shaped by local and national politics.
This project is investigating the practice of representation of Zoige Plateau entangled with political, cultural and socio-ecological relations and developing the performative representation as a form of resistance for local people to confront ongoing separations from their ancestral knowledge.
Gallery
More about Mingxin
Biography
Mingxin Li is an environmental architect and researcher focusing on the problem of representation of Zoige Wetland. Before developing his PhD project at the RCA, he speculated the mode of the symbiosis of bacteria and stromatolite in Salar de Llamara through mapping, animation and fiction writing, which was his graduation project developed from Lithium Triangle Research Studio of MA Environmental Architecture.
Currently, he is an architectural researcher at studio INTERPRT and G.I.T. (Territorial Research Group). In 2024, he won 2024 Food Action Award (Emerging Practice) funded by CLIMAVORE X Jameel at RCA, seeking ways to address the disappearance of the yak herding wetlands in Zoige Marsh, the east border between Tibetan Plateau and mainland China.
His collective and personal works have been exhibited at the Helsinki Biennial 2023, Galeria Municipal do Porto, Färgfabriken, Het Nieuwe Instituut, Design Chongqing Biennale 2022, and Tongji University.
Degrees
MA Environmental Architecture, Royal College of Art, 2020
BA Environmental Design, Jiangnan University, 2018
Exhibitions
(2024) 'Cyclone Pam Stories' (INTERPRT). Climate Crisis and Cultural Loss. TBA21-Ocean Space & NTU ADM Gallery.
(2023) ‘Colonial Present: Counter-mapping the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions in Sápmi’ (INTERPRT). Helsinki Biennial 2023. HAM Helsinki Art Museum, Helsinki.
(2023) ‘Montanha Invertida’ (G.I.T.). Desejos Compulsivos. Galeria Municipal do Porto, Porto.
(2023) ‘The Ends of The World’ (Lithium Triangle Research Studio). Desejos Compulsivos. Galeria Municipal do Porto, Porto.
(2022) 'Towards a Symbiotic Mode of Development'. Design Chongqing Biennale 2022. Chongqing.
(2020) ‘The Ends of The World’ (Lithium Triangle Research Studio). Lithium. Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam.
(2016) 'GREEN IS CREATIVE'. Tongji University, Shanghai.
Publications
'MICRO-ORGANISMOS NO DESERTO' in Lítio-Estados de Exaustão (Eds.) Francisco Diaz, Anastasia Kubrak and Marina Otero Verzier. Dafne Editora / Galeria Municipal do Porto, 2023.
'Microorganisms in the Desert' in Lithium: States of Exhaustion (Eds.) Francisco Diaz, Anastasia Kubrak and Marina Otero Verzier. Het Nieuwe Instituut / Ediciones ARQ, 2021.