From 31 August, Hauser & Wirth presents a new sound and video installation by the Peruvian-born, Berlin-based artist David Zink Yi. The title of the 11-part work, ‘Why am I here and not somewhere else – Independencia II’, refers both to the work itself and to its viewer.

‘An important feature in the Cubans’ understanding of music is the special articulation of the sense of time by the rhythmic pattern Clave, which makes a kind of dialectic possible. The musicians create their highly inventive music collectively as well as individually, always with reference to the rhythmic pattern and to each other. They enhance the whole with something that in music is called ‘Independencia’. In this a single musician attempts to mesh different grooves by operating his limbs independently, as if he were not a single musician but several’.

– David Zink Yi

Zink Yi has been studying Cuban music for many years. In May 2013 he invited 11 Cuban musicians to perform in the historic spaces of the Kunstverein Braunschweig in Germany. The artist positioned each musician in a separate room of the Villa Salve Hospes, allocating a specific function and voice to each space within the framework of the performance. The musicians played pieces by Zink Yi, arranged by Michel Alonso Castro and Yuliesky Gonzalez Guerra, as well as compositions by Alain Pérez. The original material for the installation was made up of videos of these performances. The installation was on view in the Kunstverein Braunschweig until 18 August, and has now been installed in a wholly new way in Hauser & Wirth’s Zurich gallery.

The musicians, many of whom are members of the Cuban band ‘De adentro y afuera’, founded by Zink Yi, were filmed individually as they performed. The videos of the performances and the close-ups of the musicians as they played are projected onto the floor of the gallery in different sizes, carpeting the space with a mixture of sounds. The viewer hears a different sound depending on their position in the room; it is only in their head that the work can completely come together.

For the opening of the exhibition on 30 August, the 11 Cuban musicians will give a live performance in the gallery spaces on the ground floor and on the lower floor.