Scry features Phi Phi Oanh's latest series of lacquer paintings on glasses which she has worked and experimented on for years.
Scrying is the act of divination through focused gazing into a glass or reflective medium. In this exhibition, magnifying glasses are used to view the lacquer skins. The title, Scry, suggests the character of the images presented as embracing of ambiguity and visual magic and that they are desperate attempts to grasp what the future beholds.
For this series of paintings, the dimensions of the skins emulate that of a touch tablet screen. Using this visual trope, through lacquer painting, the artist loosely reflects on contemporary imagery -- that which new technologies such as drones, digital, satellite, nanotechnology can visualize. They too are a kind of looking glass through which we can grasp our surrounding and material world.
The magnifying glasses augment the illusion of magic in lacquer painting while simultaneously giving away its means of construction. The skins are back lit and front lit to optimize the pure qualities of the lacquer painting that one would not be able to see on another surface.
The exhibition will open December 16, 2016 and be on display until January 16, 2017.
Free entrance