Since the first visit to Tibet in 2010, Ni Daodao has been in the region countless times – a deep connection with the country has developed. Tibetan friends have told so many stories of forced displacement and Ni Daodao has also witnessed own brutal oppression. The artist read books about the sociopolitical history of modern-day Tibet, such as the work by the researcher Li Jianglin entitled “When the Iron Bird Flies: China’s Secret War in Tibet”. The more Ni Daodao discovered about Tibet’s suffering and grief, the more it became clear that Tibet’s history needed to become known. After the telegraph operator Atanobu from Litang had watched the Dalai Lama crossing the border to leave China in 1959, he wrote to the CIA: “Please inform the world about the suffering of the Tibetan people.”
“As an artist and as a person who is pushed to the margins of society by the mainstream culture of the Chinese mainland due to my own fluid gender identity, I don’t just feel a connection to Tibetan culture, I also believe that my artistic practice can be a way of showing the world the struggles of the Tibetan people.”
Tibetan prayer flags are small, square flags printed with religious texts and images that are used by the locals to link the world, nature and the gods with one another. Ni Daodao collected many of these flags on earlier trips to Tibet – as an accompaniment on the journey from mainland China to Switzerland, the place of settlement. Coincidentally, there are thousands of Tibetan diaspora living in Switzerland, especially in the Alpine regions, where conditions are similar to those in Tibet. The Linzhi region in Tibet, for example, is known as the little Switzerland of the East.
Without knowing exactly how, Ni Daodao had wanted for many years to create works that would tell Tibet’s story.
In December 2022, when the winter’s first snow was falling in Zurich, Ni Daodao decided to create visual and tactile poems and combine them with performance and video installations. Through artistic practice, Ni Daodao is hoping to collect and share the stories of the Tibetan diaspora in Switzerland.
Ni Daodao’s project will reflect the changing seasons in Switzerland. From winter 2022 onwards, the artist will use the Tibetan prayer flags from the own collection to create a visual or tactile poem in every season. To prepare, in-depth research on the history of the Tibetan diaspora in Switzerland is conducted. This will include research trips to local libraries and archives as well as visits to and interviews with Tibetan communities in order to collect verbal accounts of their own journeys and thoughts. Every season, the poem created by Ni Daodao will be tied to a floating balloon. The artist will then take the floating balloon and the poem and move around social and natural spaces such as public transport, Tibetan quarters, Tibetan Buddhist monasteries, mountains, rivers and lakes. The performances will be filmed and transformed into video works that can then be exhibited and distributed.