Liang-Jung Chen
We hosted Taiwanese Artist and researcher Liang-Jung Chen for a week long residency back in April 2023. Based in London her multi disciplinary work is poetic, calm and meticulous with an underlying sense of curiosity which we felt was synonymous with the cottage and our approach to the space. I was intrigued at how she weaves domestic narratives and societal structures into projects that cross the disciplines of art, product and performance. Her practice is highly conceptual but also approachable; a rare and coveted combination in a corner of the art scene often dominated by a lot of words and fluff.
壺嘴及其用戶流失率 ‘the spout and its churn rate’ 2022
I met Liang at the cottage towards the end of her week long residency. The atmosphere was serene. Liang was taking the opportunity to work on some contemplative drawings based on the chinese calligraphic alphabet. As we sipped on a herbal tea she explained that the idea was to create a set of diagrammatic sketches exploring the notion of learning the shapes and rhythms of the characters as a young girl. The drawings are made up of tiny lines - reminiscent of a tally chart. The work felt like an exercise in determination yet was extremely personal and delicate. It spoke of the painstaking process one goes through to learn how to write and combine characters in this form. In abstracting and mapping the shapes with rhythmic lines the process itself became extremely contemplative. The end result is not representative of the characters themselves but rather a sort of mathematical exploration of how the shapes are formed on the page.
We spoke a bit about how drawing can act as a form of contemplation. Aside from the obvious notion of focusing the attention on a physical process there is something transformative about this type of drawing. The repetitive mark making allows the inner dialogue of ones mind to wander. The physical actions and sounds of the pencil become a subconscious rhythm and you can find enough stillness to really relish (and sometimes to despair) in your own thoughts.
陰晴圓缺之於自負盈虧 - ‘ebb is to flow as wax is to wane’ , 2023
I was suddenly envious of Liang; drawing peacefully in the cottage, a cup of tea steaming gently on the desk and her laptop playing ambient music while the leaves rustled on the tree outside the window. It reminded me I need to sit down and draw like this more.
The notion of subverting objects and processes is a theme Liang appears to visit often in her practice. Her approach to physical and ephemeral things helps viewers to look at them in new lights and find different meanings.
It is this playful questioning of shapes, objects and ‘things’ that is encapsulated so perfectly in one of her on-going projects the ‘Hardware Archive’. ‘A virtual home to an ultra random selection of household hardware items found online and around the world.’ - this joyful online collection is curated and managed by Liang but open to submissions. The project defines hardware as a ‘mass-produced artefact that is not capable of functioning on its own.’ Much like the letters in the Chinese alphabet these objects are floating - they need other parts to be understood and used. Again Liang is preoccupied by the idea of needing to document, though maybe more importantly to hold onto and celebrate something that might be hard to understand out of the context of its surroundings.
As I make another tea downstairs in the kitchen I note the way Liang has arranged some pears in our little vintage egg holder. Its a simple thing - probably one she didn’t think much of, but it spoke volumes of her curiosity for the things we use every day and how through our interactions affect our experience of our surroundings. It’s a reminder of her sense of humour. I make a note that as I move through my day interacting with different objects; the door handle, a spatula, the coffee table, that I should be more inquisitive and playful in my movements too.
Liang has donated one of the drawings made at the cottage to ‘Drawing for Food’ a great initiative which leverages architectural and spatial drawing to advocate for vulnerable members of the community.
