He Fa on the Twin-Fork Protractor Performer

Two sets of orange boards open into V-shaped forks behind my shoulders. Purple discs remain at their ends, and purple straps support them from my shoulders. He Fa stands upright in a cream-grey suit, with green gloves and boots as though ready for a task. The whole pose feels like measurement, yet the apparatus has no numbered scale. I cannot read an angle from this earnest appearance.

Evaluation often acquires such a posture first. A framework is set up, components align and the direction of comparison is unmistakable, while the result may lack reliable standards. Treating something that looks like an instrument as a tool capable of objective readings lets judgement borrow credit from appearances before measurement has even begun.

The forks do not replace my limbs. Both hands remain visible in front, allowing performance to be distinguished from operation. I can openly say that I am demonstrating an evaluative posture without depriving the artwork of its basis. Art may withhold a reading. The danger is when that posture is later used to rank other people while refusing to explain how its scale was set.

Public standards do not guarantee that evaluation will become undisputed. Starting points, objects of comparison and purposes can all alter the outcome, and some differences do not belong on the same ruler. Acknowledging these limits should make judgement more specific, not exempt every judgement from checking. I will explain what a particular comparison can answer, and put the instrument down when it crosses that limit.

I leave the orange forks open without hastily adding professional-looking numbers at their ends. The absence honestly retains what this apparatus has not completed. If an angle is to be read one day, let us first find a way to calibrate it. Until then, the gloves can hang quietly, so that the appearance of evaluation and its grounds are at least no longer confused in a single frontal photograph.