Lotus Laurie Kang’s artworks evolve with time. Working across sculpture, photography, installation and drawing, the artist uses her acute sensitivity to process and site to reflect on bodies, identities, memories, and histories. For Kang’s first institutional solo exhibition in Europe, In Cascades reorganises the spaces and fissures of Chisenhale Gallery, asking what is passed down and what is lost as we move through the world?
At the centre of the exhibition, ten industrial steel joists are suspended from the gallery’s ceiling. Echoing the lotus root – a recurring motif in Kang’s practice – the joists contain cavities that enhance their strength; a generative absence through which Kang’s commission materialises. Swathes of exposed photographic film tumble from each joist. Vulnerable to their surroundings, their porous skins continue to absorb light and humidity; bodies in states of perpetual becoming.
Sculptures, using tatami mats as their foundation, lie on the floor of the gallery. A portable, domestic technology, they imply cyclical movement and adaptability; a vessel upon which to rest a body on the move. Elsewhere, sand-cast aluminium sculptures of lotus roots, anchovies, and kelp knots sprout discreetly. Seven rat pups, cast in coloured glass, recline and tangle at the edges of the gallery. They are in-betweeners that live across and within the hollows of infrastructures; repellent pests, accepted kin, and human proxies in scientific contexts.
Through close attention to material, site, and process, Kang’s commission slips between what is seen and what is felt, what is abundant and what is lost, continually imprinting upon us the recurring question: what sticks and what falls away?
As an extension of Kang’s commission, her first publication will launch in July 2023, including new photography; a conversation between Kang and poet CAConrad; an essay by writer Estelle Hoy; as well as original texts by the exhibition’s curator Amy Jones and curator Victoria Sung.
In Cascades is commissioned by Chisenhale Gallery, London, and the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, where the exhibition will be presented from 22 September 2023–7 January 2024.
Lotus Laurie Kang’s artworks evolve with time. Working across sculpture, photography, installation and drawing, the artist uses her acute sensitivity to process and site to reflect on bodies, identities, memories, and histories. For Kang’s first institutional solo exhibition in Europe, In Cascades reorganises the spaces and fissures of Chisenhale Gallery, asking what is passed down and what is lost as we move through the world?
At the centre of the exhibition, ten industrial steel joists are suspended from the gallery’s ceiling. Echoing the lotus root – a recurring motif in Kang’s practice – the joists contain cavities that enhance their strength; a generative absence through which Kang’s commission materialises. Swathes of exposed photographic film tumble from each joist. Vulnerable to their surroundings, their porous skins continue to absorb light and humidity; bodies in states of perpetual becoming.
Sculptures, using tatami mats as their foundation, lie on the floor of the gallery. A portable, domestic technology, they imply cyclical movement and adaptability; a vessel upon which to rest a body on the move. Elsewhere, sand-cast aluminium sculptures of lotus roots, anchovies, and kelp knots sprout discreetly. Seven rat pups, cast in coloured glass, recline and tangle at the edges of the gallery. They are in-betweeners that live across and within the hollows of infrastructures; repellent pests, accepted kin, and human proxies in scientific contexts.
Through close attention to material, site, and process, Kang’s commission slips between what is seen and what is felt, what is abundant and what is lost, continually imprinting upon us the recurring question: what sticks and what falls away?
As an extension of Kang’s commission, her first publication will launch in July 2023, including new photography; a conversation between Kang and poet CAConrad; an essay by writer Estelle Hoy; as well as original texts by the exhibition’s curator Amy Jones and curator Victoria Sung.
In Cascades is commissioned by Chisenhale Gallery, London, and the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver, where the exhibition will be presented from 22 September 2023–7 January 2024.