



There is a wonderful new artist in town. I last saw her at her first major solo at Osage Singapore end of Sept 09. Who is she? What is her pedigree? Here is her amazing profile, one that reveals that we have still got it here in Singapore - to spot a talent in the making despite our numerous estwhile faux pas.
Jane Lee was born 1963 in Singapore. She graduated from LASALLE-SIA College of the Arts with a BA in Fine Arts and a Diploma in Fashion. Her works have been exhibited in a number of notable exhibitions in the region such as Wonder, Singapore Biennale 2008, where she presented Raw Canvas. Other exhibitions include CODE SHARE: 5 continents, 10 biennales, 20 artists, Contemporary Art Center, Vilnius, Lithuania (2009), Coffee, Cigarettes and Pad Thai: Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia, Eslite Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan (2008), Always Here But Not Always Present: Art in a Senseless World, Singapore Management University, Singapore (2008) and the solo exhibition, Transformation / Process, Taksu Gallery, Singapore (2006). Lee has won several awards, most recently the 2007 Sovereign Art Prize (finalist), Hong Kong, and was also the first recipient of the Singapore Art Prize in 2007.
I asked her some questions through an email interview. Here are the questions and her responses:
RJ: Jane, how would you describe your art? Are they paintings? Are they sculptures? I sympathize with you if you find this question irrelevant. We use our analytical knife to demarcate areas in our fields of endeavor to be able to make sense of them.Perhaps there is an in-between category for your art? A “fabric sculpture” perhaps? Or a “dressed painting”?
JL: While my works are about painting, it is also about challenging what we understand painting to be. They are about pushing the boundaries in painting, and seeing the impossible. The emphasis, or fetishisation, about the medium is not as important as what my work is about.
RJ:Is there some area of art making that you are challenging with your work? I see the weave,the contours and creases and some sensuous feel in your work that reminds me of fabric.(Perhaps this is further accentuated by the fact that I am cognizant of your background in fashion).
JL: My works question painting—what constitutes a ‘painting’, and how paintings can be made. In other words, my paintings explore the possibilities of constructing one. They are not about fabric at all.
JL: Paint has its own tendencies, so I just let things happen. Sometimes things don’t turn up well,and certain parts have to be retouched. These are parts where you see a thicker layer of paint. Therefore, any similarity to fabric is incidental.
RJ: A famous example cites that if you take a teacup and line it with fur, it has to be considered a work of art, because perhaps there is nothing else left to consider it as. Perhaps this is how you pitch your art work against our increasingly static perception of art (which of course needs to be violently jarred at its very foundations every now and again). You have created a new type of fabric. One that is no longer a fabric. Perhaps you have taken a potentially craft-like area of work into the realms of art? Can you comment?
JL: It’s not my conscious intent to incorporate dress-making (craft) elements into my artwork. The influence of my fashion background on me is subconscious, something that I cannot escape. The concern in my paintings is not for fabric; it’s for the material components of a painting.For example, the canvas—as a material—, which is part and parcel of painting.
RJ: It would be interesting for my readers to understand how you came to using the particular material for the making of your art. What was the process? How long did it take? What influenced you and what were the considerations or the criteria for you to narrow down your choices.
JL: I don’t set out to use particular types of material, although I do explore alternative sources other than fine art shops: everyday life for tools like spoons, forks, cake-making icing nozzles, ham slicers, syringes, and even simply my own bare hands, and industrial suppliers for alternative qualities of acrylic and oil paint and mix media materials. Any and all kinds of material may come into play.
JL: Of course, the tools chosen have to interact well with the paint. They have to be able to bring out the beauty and/or interesting qualities of the paint; they have to be the means through which the paints manifest a certain character. To me, (the characteristics of) paint is what’s important—the tools are merely a medium.
JL: My technique is largely trial and error. As part of my primary motive to push the boundaries of painting, I test and pursue all possibilities.
JL: It all started back when I was painting in the traditional style. One day, I noticed the beauty of the acrylic paint that has dried onto my palette. This made me realise my painting had already begun on the palette, even before the first application of paint onto canvas. Painting can exist without a canvas, I realised. This epiphany inspired me to explore indirect means of painting, such as by working on a painting’s components before sticking them onto the canvas, as opposed to through the direct way of applying paint straight onto canvas. It takes me about a year to complete each project.
RJ: Finally, I am wondering if there was a conscious effort in your part to de-gender or to ‘genderise’ your art. Do you for instance want your art to be recognized as woman-made, bringing perhaps feminist meanings into your work? You might not have consciously thought of it in that vein. Has there been anyone who has suggested that your artwork is essentially feminist?
JL: The delicate details on my paintings may look ‘woman-made’, but then the large scale that some of them are constructed on also implies a ‘man’s touch’. There are both masculine and feminine connotations taking place at the same time. This, I think, reveals my belief in the notion of Yin/Yang, in the idea that a duality exists in every individual. This duality results in elements of masculinity in women, and of femininity in men.
JL: I do understand the imperative to categorise—there is safety and security in knowing for sure that man fit a certain type, and women another. However, I don’t think it’s right to label artists that way, viewing their work through the lens of gender expectation, and thereby possibly interfering with the meaning. After all, the beauty of art is in its exploration of ‘in-between’ conditions and spaces.
JL: I definitely do not take conscious effort to implicate gender into my work. I do, however,consciously discard the limiting notion that I am a woman. During my process, gender identity ceases to exist for me.
RJ: You art is beautiful. It is immediately seductive. What is your view on the aesthetics of your art? Are you seducing your audience to draw them closer to reveal and perhaps hide new interpretations? Is aesthetics to you more than seduction?
JL:I do seek to create a compelling quality about my artworks, compelling enough to draw people closer. This is perhaps the essence of all visual art.
JL: However, I feel that seduction is cheap. Seduction requires effort, conscious intention, and therefore will not last long. Rather, I see myself offering viewers stimuli that evoke the beauty inherent in each one of them. The beauty comes not immediately from what I present to them, but comes instead from my prompting them to slow down and surrender to their inner nature, allowing joy to overtake. My works are purely the trigger.
















