41.82379°N, 71.38497°W

Author

• Xiaotong CaiFollow

Date of Award

Spring 5-22-2026

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

Digital Media

First Advisor

Mariela Yeregui

Second Advisor

Rachel Vera Steinberg

Third Advisor

L.A. Samuelson

Abstract

I, Xiaotong Cai, have known an abandoned bridge was lifted and stuck at 64-degree from 1976. I have walked and bent down towards it for over 60 times, each paralleling a journal entry. The visits and 27,351 words (up until May 5th) are the living proof: observation, encounters, correspondence, collectively and personally. It’s been nine months since it emerged in flux. Two flesh. A moving outsider and a still bridge. How can an Unused giant activate a human body? Who is the attractor and intervener?

Here, my solution is to conduct a series of small gestures. I say, interpreting without interpretation. A primitive voice reading sentence by sentence. I say, it must be scrupulous. Presence penetrating the organ. I insist, the only way to approach the bridge is the vision once you are there. You shall be present to the bridge as it is so clear to you, facing you, the Great Silence.

The logic is: walk-write-read-gather-walk, until the bridge is demolished. All writing must be triggered after being there. In the concerns of the representation of performance works and the gallery space, this version starts and grows in a durational reading, ending in a collaborative walk by signing agreements with the audience. Within two sites, art and life, a body is walking, returning and leaving. Where should a piece go?

Recommended Citation

Cai, Xiaotong, "41.82379°N, 71.38497°W" (2026). Masters Theses. 1570.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/masterstheses/1570

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.