Wu Lao Bai is a contemporary artist, independent video creator, and social activist. Through public artistic action and intervention, Wu seeks to bring to light obscured and neglected social issues. Focusing on the experiences of marginalized and vulnerable groups, he interrogates gender and identity politics and the survival of the individual in the face of institutional pressure and rapid urbanization.
Wu’s practice encompasses various mediums, extending into fieldwork, documentary filmmaking, performance art, and theatre. Operating outside of institutional settings, he engages directly with the public and social structures. In this way, art functions not as a purely representational device, but as a tool to restructure social relations and public discourse.
In recent years, Wu has continuously participated in, and initiated a number of public art projects, spanning urban renewal, public health, labor rights, and gender politics. In Death Identity Card (2016), he investigates the disappearance of marginalized urban workers in a mobile society by tracing the circumstances surrounding unclaimed bodies in Guangzhou. In Xingqing Palace (2015-2016), je explores everyday narratives refracted through social archives based on local history and folk memory. In the documentary Lovers (2018-2019), he stages a long-term intervention into the phenomenon of conversion therapy in China through field research, expounding on issues of medical ethics, gender oppression, and psychological dynamics.