Representing the Ephemeral

How do we understand performance art through secondary documentation? What are the limits of the archive in communicating the power of protest or an act of resistance expressed through art? Hong Kong based artist and researcher wen yau presented a performance-lecture exploring the challenges of representing performative action in an archival setting. Looking to the transmission of knowledge and culture through the performing body, articulated as *The Repertoire* by scholar Diana Taylor, wen yau draws on her own experience at the intersection of arts and activism during and following the 2014 Occupy Central protests also known as the Umbrella Movement. wen yau's auto-ethnographic research into ongoing political and cultural struggles in Hong Kong questions how we remember/re-enact gestures of solidarity from past and present generations of artists and dissidents. grunt was excited to share wen yau’s first-hand experience with the massive anti-extradition law demonstrations that swept Hong Kong in 2019.