Jiayang Huang

The Dream within Huang Long Cave(2024)

精神分析艺术系列：黄龙有梦

Credits: Jiayang & His family

What is this project？

《黄龙有梦》是一个以虚拟现实为基础的交互叙事游戏，探索了个人成长、家庭关系和自我认知的复杂主题。游戏的背景设定在一个虚拟版本的黄龙洞，这里有三个来自不同时空的黄龙洞，每个洞穴中都有不同阶段的同一个人物——“耀”（Yell）。

The Dream within Huanglong Cave is both an artistic research project and a solo exhibition by Jiayang Huang, presented at Three Shadows Photography Art Centre in Beijing in September 2024. The exhibition unfolded through the artist’s psychoanalytically informed practice and featured the interactive narrative game The Dream within Huanglong Cave, a monologue-based animation, On the Path of Gem Mount, and a selection of related family archives.

At the center of the exhibition is an interactive narrative game based on mixed reality, exploring themes of personal growth, family relationships, and self-awareness. The game is set within a virtualized version of Huanglong Cave, where three versions of the same cave exist across different times and spaces. In each of these caves, players encounter the same character, Yell, at different stages of life.

By speaking with Yell in these different temporal states, players gradually come to understand his emotional and psychological predicaments. Throughout the game, they must also search for clues embedded in the environment in order to help Yell confront and work through these struggles. In this sense, the experience is not only a journey of character development within the game, but also an opportunity for players to encounter and reflect on their own inner selves.

Exhibition Review, by Rui Hu

Even if what we seek remains elusive, can the act of seeking itself hold profound meaning?

As an individual in existence, Jiayang Huang is undergoing a long journey of search. If his earlier works in the United States were outward explorations through the photographic history and internet cultural memes, then this exhibition can be seen as a reflection of his recent two-year shift in focus towards the internal and the past.

The “Dream” in the exhibition title refers not only to the entanglement and struggle between possibility and inevitability experienced by the characters in the works, but also to the object and method of the artist’s inward exploration during the creative process. Employing psychoanalysis as both a tool and a frame of reference, Jiayang delves into themes of selfhood, growth, and family dynamics. The works offer no straightforward interpretations; instead, through an interplay between poetics and games, we experience his journey, bearing witness to the confusion, fantasies, conflicts, and resolutions therein.

The Dream within Huang Long Cave reveals familial narratives spanning two generations – the artist’s and his father’s, and On the Path of the Gem Mount takes us on a seemingly endless trek blending reality and virtuality, where we experience the stretched and extended psychological time. Meanwhile, The Puzzle of Aechmea Fasciata, a video work made two years ago, can be seen as a turning point bridging geographical and temporal distances, offering a glimpse into the motivations behind Jiayang’s act of pursuit.

This exhibition does not hastily offer a conclusive answer regarding the outcome of the search. Whether or not we successfully play through the game work in the exhibition, we may discover a similar quest deep within our own consciousness, and find solace in this shared human experience. After all, delving into the depths of one’s inner self usually demands courage greater than any outward journey.