Columbia City Paper

By Judit Trunkos

Art + Cayce’s new exhibition features a dual show “Kidult – Being.” Two Taiwanese art students are visiting from the Tainan National University of the Arts. Chen Chih-Yu presents her show, “Kidult” and Lin Lung Chieh shows his ceramics as part of the “Being” installation. Both shows can be seen through May 27 at 1329 State Street in Cayce.
The dual exhibition demonstrates a unique and outstanding depiction of children by Chih-yu and a basic existential being by Lung Chieh. The ceramic sculptures are non-functional pieces, most of them installed on the wall or simply hanging on a wire to achieve the needed visual effects. Walking into the gallery, some viewers will undoubtedly be stunned by a tortured rabbit, whose body was torn into two pieces.  Going deeper in the rabbit hole, there is much more to discover.
Chih-Yu is inspired by more feminine objects and creatures such as cats, babies and children. In her work “Pillow Box,” she created an open ceramic box which is hanging on a wire, and painted many intertwining children’s faces and other imaginary objects resembling body parts, flowers and sea creatures. The fantastic drawings and paintings are reminiscent of the colors and styles of Japanese prints. The ceramic pieces lead viewers into a fantasyland, seemingly into the mind of the artist itself.
Lung-Chieh’s” Being” features more masculine pieces and darker colors. His works depict complex and complicated individual beings that are often not titled. The untitled works represent the essence of all, not just human beings, creating long and curvy horn-like creatures. The extent of Lung-Chieh’s fantasy and imagination almost crosses into a dream-like surrealist collection of work, in which the viewers will spend time trying to understand the intention of the artist.
The artists synchronized their work to the extent that both Chih-Yu and Lung-Chieh added mysterious black cutouts to their sculptures. The black shadow-like additions sometimes serve as an extension to the ceramics and sometimes as some sort of connection between pieces. While it is up to the viewers to figure out the role of the shadows, the experience provides a great intellectual game for art lovers.

Bookmark It