The Exhibition By: Vanessa Kang
Curatorial Rationale I strive to create art that is whimsical and dreamy in style. The intent behind my artworks was to bring people happiness and to remind the viewers of the things everyone has in common. For this exhibition, I wanted to bring that feeling and convey that idea to my viewers. Over the past two years of IB visual art, artists like Andy Warhol and Wayne Thiebaud have been a source of inspiration for my art-making. I really like the way they utilize color and form in order to give a unique twist to familiar Items and to make viewers question their perception of the world. Over the summer, I gained interest in a form of art called surrealism, which uses realistic elements and combines them in an unusual way. Because of this, a lot of my works from this past year are inspired by this genre of art. Magritte's works are iconic examples of surrealism which I was heavily inspired by. He utilized the idea of unfamiliar space and composed his work so that elements of his paintings were suspended in unexpected ways. Through my oil painting “Dreamscape” which is an imaginary landscape with half of the canvas depicting day and the other half night, I wanted to experiment with surrealism and mimic Magritte's intention in portraying subjects in unusual ways. In my work, I combined natural elements such as the sky, clouds and a stream with man made elements such as the stars hung from the top of the painting to create juxtaposition. Due to the impact of the Coronavirus, my IB art class was not able to have the larger enclosed space we wanted as it would have been too crowded. The original plan for our show was to organize all of the space into a "home" and each artist would represent a certain room such as the bedroom, the study room, or the kitchen. Because of the rearrangement of the space, we had to completely rearrange what we were given. Due to the fact that our new space was in a hallway in front of classrooms, we had to adapt by incorporating a completely different approach for curating the show. I created "Reach for It" in response to the changed location In terms of my exhibition, Now that there are people freely walking in between the panels of my exhibition, I wanted to add a more interactive aspect to it in order to engage my viewers. I mixed up the mediums of work so that moving through the exhibition would be like experiencing something new with each piece of artwork. The reason I chose to pick these pieces for the exhibition was because I think that they are the most resolved and all depict daily objects in a surreal or unique way which I think will intrigue my viewers. Exploring a variety of mediums like watercolor, micron pen, gouache and oils, I essentially want to depict simple things and I hope my art reminds viewers of happiness and the things everyone has in common and spreading joy. Word Count: 510
The Exhibition Space Organization of Pieces
The Exhibition
I put the pieces closer together so that it looks like it is all part of one series. I also put the ones with "bunny imagery" and in black and white together so that the entire collection looked more cohesive.
The navy background of the panels I chose also helped enhance my pieces which are all lighter in color. I also set up spot lighting in order to make the pieces stand out more.
Artwork 1All Things Strawberry Medium Colored Pencil, gouache, watercolor on paper
Size 15cm x 23 cm, 6 in x 9 in
“All Things Strawberry� is a four-part gouache, watercolor and colored pencil piece which depicts a series of four strawberry desserts. My home country, Taiwan, is commonly regarded as a "strawberry kingdom" for its success in strawberry cultivation. When I spent my summer abroad in the U.S, I realized how many seemingly insignificant aspects of my own culture, such as strawberries, that I take for granted. Despite this slightly melancholy message, I hope to convey a feeling of appreciation and happiness for one's culture through utilizing vibrant colors for both the subject matter and the background in the piece.
“On Cloud 9” is a stylistic continuation of my other work “Dreamscape". Entirely composed of black cardboard, the house represents a place of security in addition to a place of imagination. The theme and concept behind this 3D piece is that when we are in our home or some place which feel really familiar, it can be a place that accepts us for who we are and can be whatever we want it to.
Medium
Cardboard, Paper, beads, fur
Size
The black interior of the house represents night time and the outside, covered with light blue paper, represents the day time.
10cm x 35cm x 45cm
Artwork 2- On Cloud 9
Artwork 3Trapped This piece was a response to people gifting pets as presents without fully understanding the responsibility of taking care of one. This practice often results in people abandoning their pets on the side of the street as they weren't aware of the financial commitment which would go into it. In my drawing, the ribbon on the top of the jar represents the "gifting" aspect of this practice and the ribbons tied around the body of the jar symbolizes how the pet is trapped and unable to escape.
Medium Ink on Paper
Size
25cm x 25cm
In addition to the main subject matter, I also chose to incorporate words that are typically used to describe pets in the background to emphasize my main message. I chose to write the text in a scrawled font in order to underscore the messy nature of this social issue. I also did the entire drawing in black and white so I could focus more on the textures and detail of the piece. I felt like a colored artwork would have distracted from the purpose of the drawing.
Artwork 4- Dreamscape
Medium Oil on Canvas
Size 45cm x 60cm
This oil painting was the first work I did during the 2020 school year. After returning from my summer in Los Angeles, I wanted to do a piece inspired by both the atmosphere and the weather of L.A which was hot during the day and extremely cold at night. To portray this, I decided to create a scene which incorporated both the scenes of night and day. Because of this, it is composed of more pastel color scheme on the right hand side and dark colors on the left hand side. Inspired by Rene Magritte and Vitaly Urzhumov's surrealist painting styles, I decided to do a painting which resembled theirs in style. My oil painting “Dreamscape� shows the convergence between night and day. This piece was made to represent my love for the radiance of daytime and the peace of night in addition to acting as an experiment for surrealism.
Artwork 5Shoot for the stars
During the exhibition, I stapled the spine of the comic onto the board and held the rest of it up with pins so that viewers could flip through the entire comic.
Medium Ink on Paper
Size 21.0 x 29.7cm, 8.27 x 11.69 inches
My Katherine Johnson Comic: Shoot for the Stars, aims to teach second to third graders about the life of Katherine Johnson, an African American woman whose orbital calculations helped NASA with the first spaceflights. Through the format of comic book, which children frequently read, I have showed the major contributions Johnson made to space exploration and STEM.
Medium Oil on Canvas
Size 60cm x 70cm
This next piece explores the idea of things and concepts which are “just pretty� as the title suggests. While I was making this piece, I was interested in the "pretty" and "aesthetic" culture that my generation is a huge consumer of. I chose a more restricted, muted color scheme for the background and every object in the composition other than the latte itself to bring the latte into the foreground and draw attention to the colors and pattern on it. Through this piece, I wanted to convey the idea things such as pretty lattes and decor that are seemingly appealing but actually mean nothing and are of no value once their visual appeal wears off.
Artwork 6- Just Pretty
Artwork 7- Snapshot Medium Charcoal on Paper
Size 30cm x 40cm
My piece""Snapshot" is a thematic extension of a graphite pencil artwork I did earlier in the year, captures 5 different scenes of a bunny and Polaroid camera. The unusual format of the piece was designed to replicate the style of the traditional Polaroid film with white borders. The reason I chose to do a piece in charcoal and in B&W was because I had never really experimented with charcoal before this and I thought it would be a good chance to do so. The oldest version of the film camera was all in black and white and I wanted to recreate that effect through my medium as well. In the center of the piece, the black space in the center represents the viewfinder on the Polaroid camera which can be used to observe the scene that a person is capturing. By seeing through it, the viewer can imagine the sixth picture as anything they want to.
Artwork 8- Galaxy Dreams Medium Ceramics
Size Roughly 15cm x 15 cm for most of the pieces
"Galaxy Dreams" are a series of ceramics pieces that were inspired by the random whimsical patterns of galaxies and planets. Though each galaxy is a unique color and pattern they are all pretty consistent in the way they look, which is the appearance I was trying to replicate through this piece. The reason I chose to place different objects in my ceramics pieces is because I am playing with the idea of juxtaposition. In Magritte's paintings, he combined seemingly random objects together in his compositions to make the viewer consider the meaning of his pieces more deeply and to observe connections in artwork and in the world. Through my artwork, I also wanted to convey a similar feeling to viewers and encourage them to think more deeply about the world.
Artwork 9- Crashing Medium Watercolor and gouache on paper
Size 28.5cm x 40cm
My piece "Crashing" is a watercolor and gouache piece that emphasizes cultural clashes and interactions between different cultures. The main subject matter of the piece, the waves, symbolize conflicting ideologies across different cultures. In the background, the large sail boat symbolizes cultural exchange as boats were often used in the past as a tool for travel and hence, communication across long distances. I chose a cool but pleasant and light shade of blue for the ocean waves to convey the idea that though differences exist between cultures, it is possible to coexist and even intertwine to form new ideas and cultures. I really liked how this piece turned out in the end but I feel like I could have conveyed the intent behind my drawing in a clearer way as it isn't clear that it is about cultural exchange.Â
Medium Final Sticker
Size Vary with design but roughly 10cm by 10cm x 10cm
"Reach for It" is an interactive art piece I did for the exhibition. For this piece, I took out various elements from previous pieces I did and made them into stickers. I stuck all of the stickers I designed onto the panels at the exhibition. My panel was located outside a classroom. As people were leaving class, they were free to grab stickers of any design they liked. It was a fun way to interact with our community and bring a bit of joy to students in an unusual time like this.
Artwork 10- Reach for It