Solace in Painting: Reflecting on a Tumultuous Century
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Solace in Painting: Reflecting on a Tumultuous Century explores the foundational question of how we raise awareness about and effectively characterize the artwork of conflicted artists of the diaspora who never produced overt “conflict art.” This question is examined through the lives and artwork of three Asian diasporic painters: 趙少昂Chao Shao-an (1905–1998), 岡山圭昭Keisho Okayama (1934–2018), and Ann Phong (b. 1957). Beyond parallel biographies touched by major U.S.-led conflicts in East and Southeast Asia over the course of the twentieth century, these artists were also selected for this exhibition based on resonances in philosophical and technical approaches to painting their experience. Each artist intimately explores the legacies of conflict across the diaspora without representationally depicting their themes. Ranging from classical Chinese bird-and-flower ink painting to monumental abstract acrylic canvases, the artworks in the exhibition resist biographical interpretation upon initial encounter. Abbreviated from a quote by Okayama, “solace in painting” points instead towards a deeper connection to the lives and approaches of these remarkable individuals. How did their artwork offer solace from and provide a space for grappling with difficult questions of conflict and identity? And, in the face of work that obscures connections to the life of the artist, how can we as viewers understand the relationship between life and art in a way that is non-exploitative and remains grounded in celebration of the artwork itself?