A turning point
Ivan Lam breaks free from the shackles of the familiar in his new exhibition Vanity Project X.
IVAN Lam is on another artistic journey with a conscious tangent, but this time it is obvious he doesn’t walk alone. In Vanity Project X, artist and curator navigate the process of Lam’s soul-searching in his newest series of work. Vanity Project X is now showing at KL’s WeiLing Contemporary, an exhibition which evolved with much conversation and reflection (on art and self ).
Following the completion of each artwork, and there are nine pieces in total, Lam engaged in conversation with art historian Dr Hanni Geiger from the LudwigMaximilian University of Munich in Germany, discussing the direction he would take for each subsequent piece.
“When Lam came up with the idea of bringing up a very personal art project, I was fascinated and thrilled about this ‘uncanny’ plan of merging traditionally very opposed working processes of hands and thought. Breaking up the unconventional meant giving up the common exhibition strategy with the curator at the very end of an art process,” writes Geiger in exhibition’s notes.
Those familiar with Lam’s work would be accustomed to his signature layering of paint and resin of recent years, which he returns to in this series – but only in the first few works.
By the time he hit the midway mark with
Diabetic Love Affair, the fifth work in the series, it is evident that some signature moves are being discarded in favour of the new and experimental as far as his usual art practice goes. This one, for instance, had its bottom half coated in honey and left out in the open for several days, attracting insects, which then became an intrinsic part of the work. The inviting of these external “collaborators” to help create this piece served as a crucial lesson on the artist’s surrendering of his ego and learning to share the medium and canvas space.
Overall, these works are a turning point of sorts for Lam, as he surrenders himself to the process of relinquishing control over the crafting of his work. How do you let go of an ego that is pushing you to “complete” every painting?
On this journey, Lam found some answers. “The entire project took about one year, starting with They Can’t Kill Us All and ending with T Marks The Spot. By the time I got to the ninth piece, I was so ready to let it all go. I lost myself only to find myself back at the very end. It was very cathartic for me,” says Lam.
They Can’t Kill Us All, made immediately after he painted They Will Kill Us All (2015), which depicts one of his daughters pointing her index finger at her younger sister in a mock shooting gesture, features the missing pistol in the earlier work. By doing so, Lam links his exploration of generational gap between family members in his solo show
Cutting The Ties That Bind (which premiered at Volta NY last year) with Project Vanity X, this new leg of the journey made only possible by acknowledging the past and looking to the future.
In Vanity Project X, the gradual disappearance of paint and resin layers was simply an evolution of moving on, to be used only when relevant.
“It symbolises that I am ready to move on to another level of understanding of how to make art. This body of work is about how to go and where to go from here. The trajectory is not always clear, but I am ready. It is a period of constant self-evaluation, self-doubt,
self-discovery,” he explains.
While Lam comments that the sessions with Geiger were “very academic and challenging” and it took him a while to get back into the vigour of art academia, one senses the reward of liberation that came from this exercise.
“We were really shooting from the hip. It was amazing to be able to completely surrender my ego and trust the other person to have your back. For example, she opened my mind to all the unorthodox materials that I had never ever considered using,” he shares.
Lam expands on the concept of duality in this show, something he has always been interested in, but this time additionally underscored by the splitting of the composition of each artwork into two parts. The First Cut Is
Deepest Uncut, for instance, draws you in with sparkling sequins in the top half, dazzling with their beauty and questioning what we are willing to sacrifice to attain it. In contrast, the bottom half is a stark contrast with its references to plastic surgery, female genital mutilation and the ageing process and its effects.
Another work, Dead Bird, which followed closely on the heels of They Can’t Kill Us All, and is the second work in the series, depicts a motionless bird suspended in mid-air vertically, half painting and half a cobweb of lines. It cleverly echoes Lam’s efforts to push himself in a new direction, but still with one foot in the familiar.
“Putting things together at opposite extremes allows me to see how they work or how they don’t. They pull and they push. I get the best or worst of both worlds. In order to be singular I have to be plural,” he concludes.
Ivan Lam’s Vanity Project X is on at Wei-Ling Contemporary, RT01, 6th Floor, The Gardens Mall in Kuala Lumpur till June 12. Open daily 11am-7pm. Closed on Mondays. Call 03-2282 8323.
Visit: weiling-gallery.com