La Cumbia (video stills) - 1999 one-channel video installation 3 min 20 In the video La Cumbia, two fingers dance to a Columbian dance rhythm of the same name on a green-painted body. The video is shot in a single, long camera sequence that brings the body into view section by section. First we see a foot, while the middle and index fingers of the right hand stand at the ready in the background. When the music starts, the fingers dance their way up the foot, up the leg, dancing over the upper body to the head, then down the body again, finally leaving it at the end of the song. The illusion of dance is interrupted several times, when the fingers return themselves to a closed palm position in order to clap to the rhythm of the music on the knee, stomach and behind the ear. The body becomes a stage, or a landscape in which the unpainted fingers take on a life of their own, exploring, touching and tapping the body. The body becomes an arena in which music and rhythm are still the key elements. Zink Yi seems to want the dancing and clapping movements on his own body to activate the 3 traces of memory contained in the music. The Cumbia is a product of different musical influences; there are tunes of native Indians in the instrumentation (the gaitas), African rhythms in the percussion instruments (the maracas) and Spanish language in the lyrics. Meanwhile, accordion sounds act as a reminder that Latin American musical culture even contains Central European influences - the accordion was introduced to Columbia by German sailors. Zink Yi's body thus becomes a kind of instrument on two levels-both mimetically, in the movements of the fingers echoing the steps of a dancer, and in the rhythmic clapping on a sounding board, giving the voices of the Cumbia a location and modifying them at the same time.