On 11 June, ESLITE GALLERY will present “SHIDA KUO: Shifting Lines and Evolving Forms.” A Taiwanese artist based in New York, Shida Kuo travels between sculptures and paintings at ease, and in this solo show he will bring nearly 30 canvas works and sculptures. Kuo has been concerned with the relations of line, form and space. His works, with their simplified appearance, is related to modern art and architecture while still aspiring for the essence and purity of forms.
Six years have passed since Shida Kuo last exhibited at ESLITE GALLERY in 2010. During this interval, Kuo dives deeper into his original aspiration. In addition to continuing searching for forgotten forms or creating new ones, he takes a further step in crisscrossing and mutually inflating or compressing his forms, so that they now appear both two- and three-dimensionally on canvases or stands.
Little Red, 2016, Enamel Paint on Aluminum, 40.5 × 21 × 26 cm, Ed. 12 + 3 AP
Untitled No. 12-08, 2012, Fired Clay and Metallic Oxides, 44.4 × 44.4 × 64.7 cm
Untitled P 07-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled E-01, 2015, Copper Plate Etching Print, 39 × 28 cm / each, set of 4, Ed. 20 + 2 AP
Kuo’s way of creation involves subtraction and meditation. All his endeavors aim at returning to the origin or his inner essence. As he confided, “I like to follow my nature, and I particularly cherish the arbitrary happenings during my creation.”
Untitled No. 12-04, 2012, Fired White Clay and Clear Crackle, 92.7 × 40.6 × 48.2 cm
Untitled No. 15-03, 2015, Fired Clay with Metallic Oxides and Wood on a Metal Stand, 132 × 55.8 × 55.8 cm
For Shida Kuo, an artwork “should carry its creator’s thoughts as well as traces of its making, showing the artist’s anxiety, insanity, or simply bewilderment, so as to become a soulful work.” Given that his works are the outcomes of his subconscious and intuition, there is no narrative content, and thus they are all named “Untitled.” The works do not form into any series, either, as each one is distinct and unique.
Untitled No. 14-03, 2014, Fired White Clay and Acrylic Paint, 92.7 × 40.6 × 48.2 cm
Untitled No. 14-02, 2014, Fired Clay and Metallic Oxides, 92.7 × 40.6 × 48.2 cm
Some of Kuo’s works make people smile, and some quietly exist, while others are like flashing inspiration. They are abstract thoughts or drifts of emotion condensed into three-dimensional forms. Strewn here and there across the exhibition space, the works invite viewers to experience, speculate on, and decode their mysteries.
Untitled No. 15-02, 2015, Fired Terracotta and White Clay on a Metal Stand, 127 × 30.4 × 86.3 cm
Untitled No. 14-01, 2014, Fired Clay and Metallic Glaze, 92.7 × 40.6 × 48.2 cm
Untitled No. 11-01, 2011, Fired Clay, Metallic Glaze and Wood, 114.3 × 38.1 × 40.6 cm
For instance, is it possible to consider Untitled No. 08-06 (2008) a piece of wineware, drunken and delighted, dancing to itself?
Untitled No. 08-06, 2008, Fired Clay and Metallic Glaze on a Metal Stand, 106.6 × 55.8 × 66 cm
Untitled No. 15-05 (2015), for female viewers, may represent a plump woman raising her leg and doing yoga, while male audience may regard it as a submarine with a telescope above sea level, inspecting its surroundings.
Untitled No. 15-05, 2015, Fired Clay, Metallic Oxides and Wood, 139.7 × 53.3 × 68.5 cm
People rich in creativity may take his works as springboards to unleash their imagination, but it may also be their inner consciousness that is actually articulating.
Untitled No. 12-03, 2012, Fired Clay and Metallic Glaze, 92.7 × 40.6 × 48.2 cm
As for his canvas works, he uses square canvases and doesn’t emphasize much on composition nor narrative content. In doing so, his works can be propped in various directions and still be able to maintain visual legitimacy. Combining acrylic paints with sculpture skills, he creates organic and amusing forms on canvas.
Untitled P 01-16, 2016, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled P 03-15, 2015, Acrylic, Burlap on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Three artistic endeavors, his preoccupations about canvas work since 2007, can be discerned: First, he continues using images that resemble flattened containers. His subjects are presented to contain internal space, like his hollowed ceramic sculptures. This is an extension of his constant exploration in inner space, for which Untitled P 02-15 (2015) is a good example.
Untitled P 02-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled P 01-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled P 05-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Second, he addresses spatial and architectural forms on canvas and identifies space via simplest lines, as shown by Untitled P 01-14 (2014).
Untitled P 01-14, 2014, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled P 02-14, 2014, Acrylic on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Third, he finds varying ways to exemplify the “purity” of painting—an obsession since college. He focuses on such basics as point, line, plane, texture, and material, without making narrative expressions, as illustrated by Untitled P 06-15 (2015).
Untitled P 06-15, 2015, Acrylic, Burlap on Canvas, 122 × 122 cm
Untitled P 11-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 92 × 92 cm
Untitled P 204-16, 2016, Acrylic on Canvas, 77 x 77 cm / each, set of 2
Untitled P 201-16, 2016, Acrylic on Canvas, 77 x 77 cm / each, set of 2
Untitled P 203-16, 2016, Acrylic on Canvas, 77 x77 cm / each, set of 2
Untitled P 202-16, 2016, Acrylic on Canvas, 77 x77 cm / each, set of 2
Shida Kuo’s works, sculptures or canvases, are his response to the primitive summoning from his inner self. Accordingly, his works appear both remote and familiar, natural and industrial, concrete and abstract, Eastern and Western—they feel intimate to us, yet they resist thorough interpretation. This is where verbal language fails. One sees something but is unable to name it. Shida Kuo’s art suggests such ineffable experience.
Untitled P 12-15, 2015, Acrylic on Canvas, 92 × 92 cm
