Description

My work in ceramics and mixed media collage revolves primarily around issues of family and my Asian-American background.  Cultural marginality and blending, tradition and Westernization, language and translation are key elements in my work.  Since the birth of my son in 1987, I have been drawing inspiration from major events in my family’s history, the day-to-day challenges of parenting, and my own childhood memories of being raised in a minority culture in the United States.  I use the image of the child to illustrate qualities of innocence, potential, vulnerability and play.  I often make reference to traditional or popular Asian aesthetics, including calligraphy, origami, Socialist Realist artwork, Chinese food and restaurants, and Tang and Han Dynasty ceramics, often set in contrast to Western counterparts.   For the exhibition “Likeness”, I have submitted pieces that represent two different styles of work, both of which express a narrative aspect of portraiture.  The first, “The Wedding Portrait” is a porcelain wall piece that, rendered in a traditionally representational style, depicts my Chinese cousins posing after their wedding ceremony in China in the early 1960’s.  At that time the Maoist regime banned many religious expressions, and their ceremony consisted of their exchange of their Mao buttons.  The last three submissions to this exhibition are three illustrations from the children’s book “Auntie Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic”  written by my sister, Ginnie Lo, published by Lee and Low, 2013.  Painted with underglazes on porcelain plates, the drawings are done in a linear, somewhat cartoony style. This book tells the true story (the names have been changed somewhat to protect the innocent!) of my aunt and my mother’s immigration to the midwest United States from China, and the discovery of one of their favorite native foods, soybeans, on a farm nearby.  It is a portrait of my family, adapting to a new world and finding community through the comfort of familiar food.