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For Immediate Release

Contact: Calandra Childers, SAM Public Relations
(206) 654-3147; email: PR@SeattleArtMuseum.org

New Installation at SAAM Explores Image and Sound

April 5, 2008 – December 7, 2008
Su-Mei Tse: East Wind
April 5, 2008


SEATTLE, March 20, 2008 – On April 5, 2008 the Seattle Asian Art Museum opens Su-Mei Tse: East Wind, an installation by Luxembourg artist Su-Mei Tse. Featuring video with musical compositions, as well as sculpture and photography, Tse strives to engage the viewer with the complexities of sound and the fluidity of influence between East and West, past and present. Her work resonates with the Chinese landscape paintings from the museum’s collections in the current SAAM exhibition Chinese Art: A Seattle Perspective, revealing an active engagement and updating of historical models in new media. The installation was curated by Michael Darling, Jon and Mary Shirley Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art.

In Mistelpartition (2006), a long, moving image of wintery trees is transfigured into found notes in a musical score. A more synthetic relationship is forged in The Yellow Mountain (2004), in which a mountainous Chinese landscape is slowly affected by an artificial yellow sun rising between the peaks, while a traditional song adds drama and cultural timbre.

The title of the exhibition also hints at the subtle Asian influences that have wafted into her work and life. A recent sculpture, SUMY (2001), playfully riffs on the electronics firm SONY, inserting a phonetic version of the artist’s name into its title. Even more evocative is the natural sound she proposes as the source for these headphones: the relentless echo of seashells pressed against the ears. Tse has also selected antique Chinese birdcages from SAM’s collection to be placed in juxtaposition with her own sculptures. Additionally, her photograph of bound feet Pieds bandés (2000) will be inserted into SAAM’s permanent collection galleries in the vicinity of a pair of “Golden Lotus” shoes.

Su-Mei Tse, born in 1973, represented Luxembourg at the 2003 Venice Biennale, winning the prestigious Golden Lion Award for best national pavilion. In numerous exhibitions around the world, Tse has become known for a dynamic union of sound and image, whether working with objects, videos, photographs or installations. As a classically trained cellist brought up in a musical family, Tse utilizes sound as a carefully considered element of her work, merging it with compelling visuals that culminate in work that sharpens the attention of the viewer / listener as they are drawn into her poetic and subtly powerful creations.

Tse will lecture as part of the Creatively Speaking series on Sunday, April 6 at the Seattle Asian Art Museum at 2 p.m. The Creatively Speaking series provides a forum for artists to explain the philosophies underlying their work and for audiences to ask the questions. The program is free with museum admission. Reservations are required. Please email boxoffice@seattleartmuseum.org or call 206.654.3121 to secure seating.

 

 
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