“ K is a unit of storage measurement for computer data.

1024 bytes =1 kilobytes (K)
1024 KB = 1 megabytes (MB)
1024 MB = 1 gigabytes (GB)

My memory captured in audio and visual data is rendered in Kbytes. Stored in hard drives, transported and exchanged in USB sticks, my life is calculated in K. K is currency in the digital market where data space is sold by GB and data ME (memory and emotion) traded by MB. Our memory consumption is a measured matter. The gadget accessories certify and confirm our mobile existence. Rewritable and reloadable, K is it.

In my past work, I.K.U. (a scifi porn feature, 2000) dispatches coders to collect orgasm data; Baby Play (2001) and Baby Love (2005) entrust clone locker babies to receive, store, transmit and negotiate ME data. K at Itpark presents personal data collection. On view at the gallery are: a web project, MILK, commissioned by 56K bastard TV/x-cult.org in 2004, seven 5th generation iPods and Four mp3 players with 320x240 pixel playback loops.” (artist statement, Shu Lea Cheang, 2006)

Shu Leas’ creative work has consistently focused on network behavior. Her current work “K”, which is being held at the same time as “Baby Love” is exhibited at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, reconsiders current digital market’s ipod and mp4 player’s memeoy capacity, whereas the title is a unit of digital data. The work set in the context of network space tackles information overload and its reduced meaningness, ultimately claims that memory is but a hard drives storage. Like a “parasite” feeds on the excrement of consumer culture, free-will exists only in determining the form consumption takes. Displayed on mini LCD screens, memories are consumed and obfuscated, perceptions replaced by consumption, visual satisfaction transformed into cyclical mixtures. Perhaps “parasites” can only exist in the boundlessness of the Net.

Digital technology makes use of the rapid distribution, facilitated by the Net, to promote “network Reading”. As such, we are all engaged in the act of “download and burn”, even creating data, fabricating non-existent information, to communicate, play tricks, entertain, consume and store data. Almost anyone can leave their own distinctive marks in the memory of the Net, causing disputes or resolving doubts. All information is processed, the important ones are retained. Images and sounds are condensed and reduced, constantly written and rewritten, then sent to people with shared interests, either acquaintance or strangers--- the concept of file sharing.

For Shu Lea, regardless of what reality is or whether it can be identified, in the process of file sharing, relative to the network experience, desire, memory, surprise, fantasy, exchange, visual and audio data are shared and channelled. The data’s complex constant flow within the network structure creates its own infinite interactivity. (Text by Chen Hui-chiao 2006)