Jane Lee. It Is As It Is

About

This is the artist’s first solo show at the Chelsea gallery since Beyond, her critically acclaimed New York debut at Sundaram Tagore Chelsea in 2012.
 
Through her work, Lee seeks to expand the possibilities of form and meaning in painting. Her paintings are less interested in depicting external phenomena than they are in revealing the internal world of painting, examining the very nature of paint itself; its latent properties and potentials as both material and object, as well as its possible behaviors and characteristics. The artist’s inclination for letting the materiality and methodology of painting take lead has remained at the core of her practice for over fifteen years.
 
Lee employs techniques such as cutting, gouging and stripping to produce her uniquely sculptural works, often departing from the reliance of a canvas’ stretcher support, or four-sided frame. On one level, they can be seen as formal investigations into the nature of the medium. On another, these incursions do not negate the conception of painting. Instead, they result in works that present an illimitable void while retaining a sense of wholeness. Her works are both painting and non-painting. They are both deconstructed and reconstructed entities, embodying both form and emptiness.

The title It Is as It Is alludes to this paradox and is referenced in a renowned Mahayana Buddhist text, the Heart Sutra. This principle of enfolding the co-existence of opposites can be seen in Lee’s presentation of these new works, some of which have been conceived to dialogue with the exhibition site in a monochromatic reverse of color between painting and space.
 
In some of the works, such as It is as it is, Play series #1, Lee incorporates the use of the heart symbol, which becomes more enigmatic with the introduction the other motifs. The use of clubs, diamonds and spades—suits in a card game—in other works seemingly suggests elements of chance and probability are at play in the making of an artwork.
 
Lee’s continuous fascination with the very base material and foundation of painting–the humble canvas–has become the key focus of the exhibition, such as with It Is as It Is, Roll series #2, where raw canvas has been reduced to bare strips, treated with acrylic paint and amassed and reconstituted into solid pieces again.
 
“The canvas has often been seen as playing a secondary role in painting,” says the artist. “There is a part of my practice that has always wanted to find ways of bringing it to the forefront. There are still a lot of stories to tell… The canvas and its different thickness; how you roll it, and how its form changes after it stretches… Just from these elements alone, there are so many interesting dimensions to express.”