Wang Tuo’s The Second Interrogation 2023 is a video installation in two parts that hinges on interpretations of the era-defining 1989 Beijing exhibition ‘China/Avant-Garde’, in particular its series of unsanctioned performances that became known as the ‘Seven Sins’. The first part of Wang’s work plays across two screens, their video and audio converging and diverging as viewers follow encounters between two characters: a critical artist and a quiet observer of art events. The second part tracks tensions across modern history and culture, culminating in a dynamically choreographed performance by young Chinese dancers that references the original ‘Seven Sins’.

The work’s combination of documentary and dramatic modes is typical of Wang Tuo’s cinema-influenced video practice, which draws on history, mythology and fiction to examine unresolved collective traumas. Inspired by cultures around his hometown of Changchun in north-east China, Wang has developed the idea of ‘pan-shamanism’, according to which humans are the bearers of collective suffering. In The Second Interrogation this is expressed through the invocation of suppressed forces beneath the surface of the earth and historical ruptures that provide glimpses of other dimensions.

Combining elements of a psychological thriller, dance piece and theoretical treatise, The Second Interrogation is a spectacularly staged consideration of the ethics of art and the dynamics of history.