"When I look myself in the mirror, I find myself in error." “Mirror Stage: i ⇌ !” is Lindy Lin's long-term artistic exploration of gender, identity, and self-reflection through deconstruction and reconstruction. The project combines audiovisual elements, improvisation, and collaboration with female, trans, non-binary, and gender-fluid artists to challenge societal norms and the male gaze. It redefines traditional symbols like the Chinese flute “Xiao”, sewing machines, and natural elements such as water and silk, creating a space for radical reinvention. This also serves as part of Lindy Lin’s graduation project for the NAIP (New Audiences and Innovative Practice) Music MA program at the Iceland University of the Arts.

The research is structured in three movements:

1. Exposition of “I”: A self-reflective journey emerging from mirrors.

2. Recapitulation of “!” : A culmination featuring voices of 14 female artists in Reykjavík out of perfect score.

3. Development of “i ⇌ !”: Interactive media process responding to external gazes.

Her self-composition/improvisation through fabric manipulation.

The exhibition marked the third movement of Lindy Lin’s reflective project Mirror Stage: i ⇌ !—the development of a self-reflective loop. It presented Lindy’s constructed audiovisual journey of self-identity through elements such as her self-reflective poetry book, self-designed costumes and fabric dialogues, the Butterfly Fluting conductive thread experience, and the Mirror Stage De/Reconstruction Feedback Loop, programmed by Örlygur Steinar Arnalds. Technologies used: Bare Conductive and Raspberry Pi.

Mirror Stage poem/painting book experience video.

This book is a collection of Lindy Lin’s paintings and poems, created as part of her ongoing self-reflective journey.

© 2025 Lindy Lin

the sketches of back and front

Dedicated to Grandpa and Grandma

敬献给阿公阿嬷——林松茂、陈祝