In a series of five year-long works the Taiwanese-American artist Tehching Hsieh captured critical aspects of the prisoner’s experience including the meaning of time, the rigours of solitary confinement, the impact of homelessness and the pressures of inescapable company. These were performed in unambiguously stark, and deeply personal, terms. In a way these pieces of art might be considered partial prison parables which point to, but do not explicate, lessons from which anyone deprived of their liberty might learn.
EtchellsT (2009) Letters: Time served. In: HeathfieldAHsiehT (2009) Out of now: the lifeworks of Tehching Hsieh. London: Live Art Development; Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 355–361.
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HeathfieldAHsiehT (2009) Out of now: the lifeworks of Tehching Hsieh. London: Live Art Development; Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
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SmithR (2009) A year in a cage: A life shrunk to expand art. New York Times, Art and Design, 18February.
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