In her work, Fay Ku grapples with her Chinese-American identity, fending off flippant sincere-yet-still-kin- da-racist questions about her cultural background as if “USA” could never be an acceptable answer to the question “Where are you from?” She does so with gratuitous patience and a sly wit by nodding to compositions and visual signifiers from art history and American culture, whether that’s making her own “Olympia” by Manet or using stage magic as a metaphor for wanting to disappear. Performers, acrobats, escape artists and magicians: subjects of her work that imply an incredible amount of behind-the-scenes focus and practice; the idea of being cut in half, escaping, disappearing right before your eyes. It also implies a lot of behind- the-scenes focus and practice to perform flawlessly for a public audience. Somewhere in there is a powerful connection to being a minority in America, where one must don jade armor to simultaneously protect one’s self and claim space proudly as independent from stereotypes and expectations.
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Coney Island Series
Melbourne artist Mark Ogge lives and works in an old church in Clunes, in country Victoria. He was the first artist commissioned by Spiegelworld, creating an entrance archway mural in 2006. Mark has long been fascinated by the iconography of the circus and fairground, exploring the dichotomy between enchantment and disillusionment.
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Absinthe Under The Brooklyn Bridge
The unpredictability of Steve Horlock’s paintings may come from his pervasive curiosity about life; or perhapshis ten-years experience body painting; possibly his fascination with mythology and the complexities of the world. Whichever it may be, this self-taught Las Vegas artist knows no bounds when it comes to painting ideas:whether inspired by Vegas’ historic Miss Atomic […]
