Yong Joo Kim, Studies in Exeru Formation: Isoclinal No. 1, 2018, Velcro®Hook-and-loop fastener, 70 × 60 × 22 cm. Photo: Yong Joo Kim

Insistent. Gestures.

Kazumi Nagano (JP)
Yong Joo Kim (KR)
Chen Chun Tai (TW)

Cyrus (Wai-Kuen) Tang (HK/AU)
Yu Fang Chi (TW/AU)

6 September – 9 November

Mon– Fri 11am-5pm
Thu 11am-7pm
Sat 12-5pm 

(OPENING)

(CURATOR TALK)

Thu 5 September 2019, 6-8pm

Tue 10 September, 12.30-1.30pm​
Early Career Curator Mentorship: Yu Fang Chi and Kate Rhodes

at 

RMIT Gallery 

Gallery 3
344 Swanston St
Melbourne 3000

WHEELCHAIR ACCESSIBLE

Yu Fang CHI, Inner Crease series, 2018, Copper, steel wire, synesthetic material, silk thread, metallic car paint, 20x10x50 cm. photo: Cheng Lin Wu

Insistent. Gestures. brings together the work of five artists who live, work or were born in Asia to explore personal narratives, diasporic identity and the use of repetition.
 
The exhibition considers the role of materials, bodily gestures and the intimate experience of making. These artists share related geographical histories and connections that respond to their stories and experience of making. Through repetitive cutting, assembling, sewing, weaving, and layering the simple materials chosen by each artist grow in complexity. The constant movement central to each artist’s process gives rise to the contemplation of time and space, and an introspective understanding of body and mind
 
The repetitive movements – or insistent gestures – of making carry a sense of ritual and intimate recollection that resonates with the artists’ personal histories. Here an insistent, female and labour creating subjectivity is woven into being.

Chun Tai Chen, Scenery in mind, 2012, paper, 28x25x9 cm. Photo: Chun Tai Chen

(ABOUT THE ARTISTS)
​
Yong Joo Kim’s ingenious designs utilize hand-cut and fabricated forms, made from Velcro hook-and-loop fasteners in red, black, and grey, that seem to move even when still. Her work introduces unconventional use of familiar artifacts into a world full of conventions. Through a domestic labour-like process of making, she hand cut, hand assembled and hand sewn Velcro hook-and-loop fastener over and over again. By assembling, grouping, clustering, and piling, the small and simple elements become complex, and give rise to the unexpected. Her investigation of creation, innovation, and transformation questions the definition of value, and provides a never-ending field for invention.
 
Kazumi Nagano is known for her wondrous jewellery work, delicate creations of thin gold wire and woven paper. With a background in Japanese-style painting and traditional Japanese weaving techniques, Nagano has applied daily materials, such as thread, paper and ink, interweaving with precious metal of gold and silver. Her artwork evokes the memory of traditional object in Asian culture. The weaved basket-shape of bracelets, and series of red lantern-like brooches, which revealed the unique beauty of domestic objects and people’s daily experience.
 
Born in Hong Kong, Cyrus (Wai-kuen) Tang moved to Australia in 2003. She finished her Degree (Hons) of Fine Arts at Victoria College of the Arts, Melbourne in 2004, and her Master of Fine Arts (Research) in Monash University, Melbourne in 2009. In these years, Cyrus has been offered by different residency programmes, including  Helsinki International Artist Program 2013; The National Art Studio in South Korea in 2012; Cite International de Arts, Paris in 2009 and The Banff Centre, Canada in 2008. 
Her works has been shown interstate in Australia and various countries including Helsinki, South Korea, Singapore, Japan, France, Shanghai and Sweden. She is currently represented by Arc One Gallery, Melbourne.
 
Majored in jewellery design, Chun-Taiis a prolific designer and artist. She’s known for using paper as her main media to materialize the relationship between people, time and texture. For several occasions, she has participated at "Taiwan Design Week" and her work has been exhibited internationally, to mention some: Shanghai, Japan, Estonia and Canada. Currently Chen works under the support of the Department of Cultural Affairs, Taipei City Government and the National Taiwan Culture and Arts Foundation.
 
Yu Fang Chi is a Taiwan-born jewellery artist, currently works and lives in Melbourne, Australia. Her practice involves repetitive fibre-related techniques which can be connected to traditional domestic art processes. Yu-Fang works across different facets of jewellery practice and collaborates with diverse artistic fields. Her recent curatorial project assembles jewellery narratives with the potential to bring subjective encounters into wider social assignations.