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#4: Sisters in Water

中文

I have always been deeply fascinated by a particular type of imagery in art history-the depiction of drowning women. Perhaps the most well-known example is Millai‘s “Ophelia".

I am captivated by this type of imagery for two primary reasons.

The first is closely related to the direction of my research. Paintings of women in water differ from traditional oil paintings. Unlike classical Western paintings, which usually feature either a ground surface or a table, that provides a solid platform for the composition to unfold, but the platform in these drowning scenes is transparent. This creates a split composition, one above and one below the surface. Its really like of today's 3D modeling software, where there are no tops or bottoms, only an infinite space that expands in all directions. The composition is built along X and Y axes, allowing objects to exist either above or below the tabletop. The tabletop is permeable.

The second point interests me is these drowning girl images often evoke two perspectives, martyrdom and eroticism. Martyrdom, of course, relates to the act of drowning. The other is the portrayal of women in water, which often suggests a sense of fantasy, or comes from the posture of the figure. This makes me think of the situations that many female professionals and female artists face today. I know that many other female artists besides myself, have felt the same way. Many exhibitions or events approach us, not because of the work we have created, but because we are women. So, this is an era that encourages women to do more. This is a good thing, but I don't think it's entirely good. Because, at the same time, it shows a certain strange expectation of women. This odd expectation runs parallel to the encouragement to create.

So, this time I reached out to all the female artist friends I could find, forty-two of them. I went to their homes and 3D-scanned them one by one. Then I placed them into the classic gray platform used in 3D modeling systems. I let them float and sink, drifting in a virtual ocean.

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