Live Streaming, Prince Edward, 12/11/2019, 23:35:05-6. 25 frames per second, 1920x1080. (2019) documents a significant period during the 2019-2020 Hong Kong Protest – in particular, the 12th of November, recorded as the day with the highest number of tear-gas canisters fired by Hong Kong police at protesters in a single day. But rather than contribute to the existing pool of citizen journalism uploaded by local protestors on the streets, Tay documents the transmission signal from the live-stream broadcast of a camera surveilling the protest. Here, a second of the tear-gas canister exploding on a protestor on TV is itself ‘exploded’ into 25 frames, thereby highlighting the nature of the broadcast signal as received and recorded by the artist (PAL transmission). Further details of such a transmission signal are also captured in the title of the artwork itself. Yet, the title does more than describe archival or technical details of this recorded transmission; it reflects on the legacies of formats and standards passed down through history, whether PAL transmission systems (favoured by the UK and former colonies of the British empire), or British dating format (dd/mm/yyyy). Presented in a single line, and hung just below eye level, the work encourages an intimate look at the entire sequence of 25 frames. One second, or 25 frames, is given such an expansive space as such, frustrating any attempt to reduce this event, or Hong Kong’s geopolitics for the matter, into any single, iconic image. This work was made alongside another of Tay’s project, the Abridge series (2018–2021), which reconsiders Hong Kong’s iconography – its cinematic glamour, its urban horrors – against the city’s political geographies.
