Livy Leung: Between a Pause

EVENT DESCRIPTION

Gallery EXIT is pleased to present a series of new works by Livy Leung, entitled ‘Between a Pause’. By altering lines, shapes, colours in real scenery, Leung creates a flattened space on the canvas towards the intersection between the real and imaginary world. The exhibition title refers to the state of waiting for something to happen in the course of creating this series, and the artist’s attempt to capture the atmosphere between pauses, before things are set adrift.

‘Repetition’ and ‘waiting’ constitute an essential part of the painter’s creative process: Repeatedly one adds and eliminates stroke by stroke, alternates between colours, and reconstructs the composition. Sometimes the final work may look almost the same as before all the changes. It may feel futile at first, but gradually one realises that this is an important part of the painting practice. The process of repeated alteration carries with it the artist’s personal state, as she waits for a sense from the image, to be slowly smoothed and flattened through repeated changes, digested, before finally becoming the image in her mind. It is the artist’s meditation. In this new series of works, Leung attempts to paint with different materials for the first time: Making use of the material properties of aluminium plates, the artist enriches the brushstrokes on the pictorial surface, partially removing the oil paint with sandpaper to highlight the lines, leaving a unique texture. The slightly rugged texture of sandpaper, the juxtaposition of matte and glitter, reminds the artist of the earth, floor tiles, the starry sky, amidst other things.

Leung habitually observes the things around her as an exercise to trigger personal associations, especially scenes that appear strange in everyday life. Earlier this year, the artist often came across dead or dying butterflies in different parts of the city. Every few steps brought her to another butterfly lying on the ground. The recurring phenomenon, coupled with the symbolic nature of butterflies, suggested to the artist that the butterflies might be transmitting some sort of message, and quietly transformed back into nutrients for the earth upon completion of their mission. Leung began imagining where those messages came from and what they were about. The butterfly imagery is found throughout the artist’s recent works, as a reflection on the connection between nature and the human body. In different cultures, the butterfly symbolises the dream/spirit/soul; in terms of composition, the butterfly’s shape evokes different natural objects, such as clouds, flowers, leaves, etc., as if they all share a form and are interconnected with one another, as in the connection between humans and nature.