Rockbund Art Museum 上海外滩美术馆

Best Synthetic Answer is an experimental seven-month, ever-evolving exhibition project by American artist and poet Rindon Johnson. Emerging from a series of discussions between Johnson and RAM artistic director X Zhu-Nowell, the exhibition navigates the complex geographies of the Pacific, interrogating traditional notions of borders, fixed territory, states, and ecocide.

The Pacific is full of commerce: its seafloor is divided up for mining, freight lanes crisscross its expanse, and commercial fishing extends across it. To maintain the current level of exploitation of the earth's resources, the Pacific is crucial to securing a capitalist future.

Best Synthetic Answer attempts to answer the question: "How does a Black American, raised on the edge of the Pacific, move through the ocean to reach Shanghai? Apart from obvious forms of resource extraction as forms of exploitation, on what levels am I also responsible for this destruction? As a consuming human on this earth? As an American citizen? As a Black person? As my parents' only son? What seismic shifts will come from the collapse of so many ecosystems? Besides, ultimately, what does anyone gain from exploitation of this magnitude? How do I witness this ocean's past, present, and future? How do I attempt to atone for the United States' historical, current, and impending destruction and exploitation of the Pacific Ocean and the people who call it home? How do I name all of that? How to swim through it? How big is the Pacific Ocean, really? Nothing is so big it cannot be measured, right?"

The heart of Best Synthetic Answer is a newly commissioned video installation, Best Synthetic Answer #1: Crossing…, that simulates a real-time journey from Johnson's birthplace– on the unceded territories of the Ohlone peoples in San Francisco– to Shanghai, China. Spanning seven months, Johnson's avatar - the "main character" of this work - swims in real-time across the Pacific Ocean, offering an immersive yet temporally unwieldy experience that attempts (and ultimately fails) to describe the immensity and multidimensionality of the Pacific specifically by following the wake of the United States’ destructive interventions. In this work, several AI models are used to ostensibly guess the live condition of the Pacific Ocean: real-time weather data and existing freely available oceanic weather datasets to generate used rate second-for-second theoretically “live" weather conditions Pacific.

Each day and every second, Johnson's avatar navigates a hyper-specific pre-determined route across the Pacific, following the hubris of the nation of his birth, the United States. Every location his avatar passes through bears the marks of places the U.S. has sought to destroy, alter, or exploit, both land and people.

As a "language-based" artist and poet, Rindon Johnson's works are fundamentally time-based; within them, Johnson inscribes time across what he considers living objects, raising questions about ownership, freedom, autonomy, exploitation, value, and waste.

This exhibition invites viewers to focus on how art objects interact with the experience of being in the space of the real world and in real time. In a place where competition for land, redrawing borders, and occupations persists, Johnson proposes a divergent way of thinking about time as a layered depth—overlaid yet constantly eroding, always folding in on itself, circling back and flowing forward.

Rindon Johnson

Born in 1990 on the unceded territories of the Ohlone, San Francisco, Rindon Johnson is an artist and poet. Moving between physical and virtual spaces, Johnson’s multidisciplinary practice is grounded in language: in its multiplicities, its failures, its contradictions, and its systemic powers. His work uses this grounding to examine how the effects of capitalism, climate and technology construct our realities. At times, Johnson focuses on specific words latching on to words that mark change or difference like “by-product,” “five,” and “trans”; he uses these linguistic studies to move both towards and away from abstraction simultaneously. He wonders what can bring us together and what pulls us apart. His combinations of word, technology and object create multi-layered works. His forms of expression range from publishing and virtual reality to leather, wood and stone.Johnson has presented solo exhibitions throughout Europe and the United States. Most recently at Albertinum (Dresden), Chisenhale Gallery (London) and SculptureCenter (Long Island City).

Johnson has participated in group exhibitions worldwide, most recently the 60th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. Johnson is the author of four books of poetry and prose, most recently The Law of Large Numbers: Black Sonic Abyss (Inpatient, 2021) and Ever Given (Inpatient, 2022).

He lives between Lenapehoking, New York, USA and Berlin, Germany.

“最佳合成答案”是美国艺术家和诗人林顿·约翰逊的一项为期七个月并且持续演变的实验性展览项目。展览源于约翰逊和上海外滩美术馆艺术总监朱筱蕤之间的一系列对话，探索太平洋的复杂地理，质询关于疆界、固定领土、国家和生态灭绝的观念。

太平洋充斥着商业活动：海底因矿物开采被划分、货运航线纵横交错，商业捕鱼也遍布整片海域。为了维持当前地球资源的开采水平，太平洋对确保资本主义未来至关重要。

“最佳合成答案”试图回答一系列问题：“一名在太平洋边缘长大的美国黑人要如何越过海洋抵达上海？除了显然易见的资源开采形式作为剥削手段之外，我在何种程度上要为这样的破坏负责？作为地球上的一名消费者？还是作为美国公民？作为黑人？作为我双亲的独生子？这么多互相关联的生态系统一旦崩溃，又会带来哪些剧变？另外，在如此庞大尺度的剥削工程里，到底谁能真正获得些什么？我要如何见证海洋的过去、现在和未来？面对美国历史上的、现在的、来临中的对太平洋和其它人的家乡的破坏和剥削，我又要如何赎罪？该怎样命名这一切？怎样游过它？说到底，太平洋究竟有多大？再大也总能测量出来，对吧？”

作为“最佳合成答案”的核心作品，全新委约创作的影像装置《最佳合成答案 1 号：横渡……》（2024）实时模拟了一场从约翰逊的家乡——奥隆人未割让的土地旧金山——到上海的旅途。在七个月的时间里，约翰逊的虚拟化身，即这件作品的“主角”将实时游泳横渡太平洋，带来一场身临其境却难以把握的时间体验，尝试（或最终失败地）沿着美国破坏性介入的余波，刻画太平洋的广阔无垠兼多重维度。这件作品使用一些人工智能模型来推测太平洋的实时状况，包括：实时天气数据和现有公开的海洋气候数据集，生成理论上“实时”的太平洋天气状况。

每一天每一秒，约翰逊的化身都会沿着一条超特定的预设路线穿越太平洋，追随他出生的国家——美国的傲慢。他的化身经所到之处都带有美国试图摧毁、改变或利用的土地和人民的痕迹。

作为一名基于语言创作的艺术家和诗人，林顿·约翰逊的作品本质上是以时间为核心的。在他的作品中，约翰逊将时间铭刻在他认为是生命的物体上，由此引发关于所有权、自由、自主权、剥削、价值和浪费等问题的思考。

展览邀请观众关注艺术作品如何与现实世界的空间和时间体验互动。在一个土地争夺、疆界重绘和占领持续存在的地方，约翰逊提出了一种不同的观念：时间是一个层叠的深度——尽管覆盖重叠，却不断侵蚀，总是在自我折叠、循环并向前流动。

林顿·约翰逊

林顿·约翰逊1990年出生于旧金山奥隆人未割让的土地，是一名艺术家和诗人。他的跨学科实践游走在物理和虚拟空间之间，以语言及其多样性、失败、矛盾和系统性的能量为基础。约翰逊的作品利用这一基础考察资本主义、气候和科技的效应如何建构我们的现实。他时而专注标记了变化或差异的特定词汇，如“副产物”、“五”和“跨”，并利用这些语言学研究迫近抽象，同时也远离抽象。他思考什么可以将我们集合在一起，什么又使我们分离。他组合文字、科技和物件创造多层次的作品，表达形式包括出版、虚拟现实、皮革、木头和石子。林登·约翰逊曾在欧洲和美国举办个展，最近呈现他展览的机构包括德国德累斯顿的德国德累斯顿阿尔伯提努（Albertinum）、伦敦奇森海尔画廊（Chisenhale Gallery）和纽约雕塑中心（SculptureCenter）。他在全球范围内参与群展，包括近期的第60届威尼斯双年展。约翰逊是四本诗歌和散文集的作者，最近的作品包括Inpatient Press出版的《大数法则:黑色声渊》（The Law of Large Numbers: Black Sonic Abyss，2021）和《长赐轮》（Ever Given，2022）。约翰逊现居美国纽约莱纳佩家园和德国柏林。

约翰逊现居美国纽约莱纳佩家园和德国柏林。