Summer Mei Ling Lee, Into the Nearness of Distance XVII, 2020, Cyanotype, Three layers of Cyanotype and gauze, wood, 26.5” x 33” x 4.5”.
The pre-classical Chinese character Li, as in the title of the poem from 300 BC, Li Sao, contains pictographs which illustrate the catching and releasing of a bird to make up the sentiment of the “woes of departing”, or the lament of being human. The character Li depicts the irony of being human in that we are constantly caught and freed, both self and non-self, translated and liberated, here and there — as could only be portrayed by a human interfering with a creature of flight, as could only be elicited by a work of art. In this work, the layers, perhaps like memories, resist one fixed image and one reading, yet convey something true to the artist. Like a migratory bird that touches down with a revelation that changes one’s life, but then flies away into the unknown.