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Artist Shirley Tse has issues to work out in her
relationship with plastic. And, indeed, she is heartily working
on her issues. With a history of utilizing everything from Styrofoam,
bubble wrap, vinyl, plastic tubing, straws and polyurethane, Tse
now endeavors her most ambitious attempt yet with polystyrene.
This year the prolific artist has presented three solo exhibitions:
in Santa Monica, California at Shoshana Wayne Gallery, in St.
Louis, Missouri at the MacLennan Gallery and in New York City
at Murray Guy in Chelsea. Another solo show is scheduled in Hong
Kong for the late autumn. I had the fortuitous opportunities to
peruse Tse's latest explorations entitled "Polymathicstyrene"
at both Shoshana Wayne and Murray Guy galleries.
Both venues featured several connecting, aqua-blue polystyrene
panels, horizontally attached lining all four walls at about hip-height
around the entire space of the main galleries. Tse intricately
and precisely carved patterns along the surfaces of the polystyrene.
The installations could be appreciated for their pure abstract
formal beauty or for the imaginative representational metaphors
they imply. Most stunning was Tse's unique and exacting utilization
of negative space and geometric carving.
The panels had the appearance of miniature architectural models,
in some respects reminiscent of the landscape of bright blue swimming
pools that can be seen across Tse's home city of Los Angeles.
Ironically, the "landscapes" simultaneously suggested
both an ancient and futuristic culture. One panel in particular
possessed sculpting akin to the pyramids and archaic temples of
the early Mayans and Egyptians. Other pieces, seemingly sci-fi
inspired, looked as if they could serve as the potential landing
sites of forthcoming aliens or futuristic peoples colonizing the
Earth.
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Shapes of circles, blocks, triangles, valleys, hills, mountains,
labyrinthine rivers, streams, ponds, pools and rivulets, deeply
sliced interstices, mazes, and slashes abound throughout the topographical
"map" of the work. Tse was the mistress of a meticulously
rendered and extremely pure, clean integrity of line and for. |
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Also, featured in smaller side galleries
for both exhibitions were Cibachrome color prints from a series
called "Diaspora? Touristry?" Tse photographed her
shiny, blue bubble wrap sculptures juxtaposed and ensconced
in stunning natural settings of the mountains and deserts of
Colorado and Utah. Again, the artist highlighted themes of the
natural versus the constructed through well thought-out compositions.
Her sculptures within such environments possess a zany, anthropomorphism,
as if they were tourists having a ducky time exploring the sights.
Tse's humor comes across most in these photos. Supposedly the
Garden of the Gods was touched by none but God until one looks
more closely and realizes that there is graffiti out on those
steep rocks.
The biggest difference in presentation by the two galleries
was that Murray Guy, the smaller of the two, permitted closer
proximity to view the details of the panels. Shoshana Wayne
Gallery possessed a generosity of space in which to frame the
installation, but meticulous design was more difficult to appreciate
from some distance.
Many ironies of modernsociety were captured by Tse: natural
versus artificial; handmade versus mass-produced; primordial
versus futuristic; and the somber versus the jocular.
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