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Sin Wai Kin and Planningtorock: manifesting alternate realities

Encounters

Collage of one person with ginger hair wearing suit with green background next to person wearing denim jacket and purple background

Photography credit: Sweatmother, Jørgen Paabu.

Join the Turner Prize-nominated artist Sin Wai Kin and singer-songwriter, producer and composer Planningtorock as they explore world building at the intersections of visual arts and music.

Barbican Encounters stages interdisciplinary dialogues between major figures shaping our culture, from the visual and performing arts to fashion, design, and technology. At each encounter, the Barbican invites two people from different creative worlds to share their experiences, giving speakers and audiences alike a unique insight into their knowledge, influences and creative process.

Biographies

Sin Wai Kin (fka Victoria Sin, b. 1991, Toronto, CA) is an artist using speculative fiction within performance, moving image, writing and print to interrupt normative processes of desire, identification, and objectification. Drawing from close personal encounters of looking and wanting, their work presents heavily constructed fantasy narratives on the often unsettling experience of the physical within the social body.


The artist’s most recent film, A Dream of Wholeness in Parts (2021) was recently nominated for a Turner Prize, and screened at The British Film Institute’s 65th London Film Festival. Their work is currently included in the touring exhibition the British Art Show 9 as well as Protozone at Shedhalle, Zürich and HYPER-POSSIBLE: Coventry Biennial 2021, Coventry. Recent solo exhibitions include It’s Always You at Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong (2021); She’s Hopeful (2018) at Soft Opening, London (2020); Narrative Reflections on Looking at Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb (2020); and Indifferent Idols at Taipei Contemporary Art Centre, Taipei (2018). Recent group exhibitions include Drawing attention at The British Museum, London (2022); Interior Infinite at The Polygon Gallery, Vancouver (2021); B3 Biennial of Moving Image, Frankfurt (2021); Born in Flames: Feminist Futures at Bronx Museum, New York (2021); The many faced god.dess, curated by Thomas Conchou at La Maison populaire de Montreuil, Montreuil (2021); Age of You, curated by Shumon Basar, Douglas Copeland & Hans Ulrich Obrist at Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai & MOCA Toronto (2020 & 2019); MORE, MORE, MORE at Tank, Shanghai (2020); Masks at Galeria Municipal do Porto, Porto (2020); Transformer: A Rebirth of Wonder, curated by Jefferson Hack at 180 The Strand, London (2019); Kiss My Genders at Hayward Gallery, London (2019); BCE at Whitechapel Gallery, London (2019) and DRAG at Hayward Gallery, London (2018). Their work is in the public collections of British Museum Prints & Drawings; The Ingram Collection of Modern British Art and Sunpride Foundation, Hong Kong.

Planningtorock – aka Jam Rostron-is a Bolton-born Tallinn based singer-songwriter, composer, producer, DJ and director with four critically acclaimed studio albums of superb queer dance to their name. A self-taught, trans non-binary, working-class musician, they've spent a decade plus queering sound and sharing visions as Planningtorock. Also in demand as a remixer, Lady Gaga, Robyn, Christine and The Queens and Romy are just a few of the artists who have enlisted Planningtorock as a collaborator. The multi talented artist who has composed music for dance works such as the highly emotive score ‘On the Cusp’ for The Cullberg Ballet, Stockholm, has worked with creative visionaries like The Knife, Peaches and more recently Arca. They have also produced original music for fashion shows together with renowned sound director Michel Gaubert on sound tracks for high fashion houses Chanel, Kenzo and Commes Des Garcon.

Frobisher Auditorium 1