“Relatively young, frustrated office lady, buried under paperwork, trying to understand the world through the OED, seeks professional help.  Looking for kind, experienced organisers and linguisticians for companionship and stimulating conversations. Meet me on 18, 25, 26 April.  Email me at intotheworb@gmail.com.”

As part of the public program for Days push off into nights, artist Ho Sin Tung will hold three intimate consultation sessions where Ho and Christina Li invite Michelle Wong (Sat, April 18, in English), Lee Chi-Leung (Sat, April 25, in Cantonese) and Wong Wai Yin (Sun, April 26, in Cantonese) to discuss the bittersweet and solitary moments of research, writing and representation. (Find documentation of the sessions in the Spring Workshop Archive Dropbox.)

Haunted by the fragments of “him” in the Oxford Dictionary and fascinated by lexicography, she decided to collect all the sentence examples with the subject “he” in the dictionary and develop her findings into fiction. After spending two years reading less than one-tenth of the dictionary, and informing herself on related subjects such as lexicography, collecting and preservation, Ho has begun to reflect on the tale of James Murray (1837 –1915), the chief editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, who thought editing the OED would only require a few years, but ended up working on it for 70 years and died without finishing it. Caught in a web of words, Ho has now become, in her words, “a frustrated office lady trapped in endless paperwork and uncertainty about her project.”

All sessions will start at 3:30 pm. Spaces are extremely limited, so please sign up at intotheworb@gmail.com.

On Sunday, April 26, the last day of the exhibition, Ho’s session will be followed by a screening of a film by Chantal Ackerman.  More information on the screening to follow.