Deanna Lee
Land scape
CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW in particular , how do your Chinese and Taiwanese roots inform the way you relate yourself to art making and to the aesthetic problem in general — that is , the importance of beauty in artistic production ?
Thanks very much for your interest in my work and the concepts and influences behind it . Prior to my decision to focus on making visual art , I received fifteen years of classical training on several musical instruments ; over time , I have come to realize the profound effect of this experience on my art and life . Growing up within a medical-science family has been another strong influence . During my years at Oberlin , I studied both art history and fine art ; the liberal-arts curriculum encouraged an eclectic and inclusive path to learning and building a conceptual and practical toolkit . I was able to explore my interest in Classical antiquity and archaeology during the half year that I spent in Rome , and that was when I first had a studio of my own ( a little corner of a passageway , really ) and thought of myself as an artist . At the School of the Art Institute of Chicago , I came to define my focus as a painter . I knew some of the Hairy Who and Imagist artists , but the influence of these groups on my work emerged later ; at the time , I was more interested in abstract painting of the New York School .
Although I am an American-born Chinese woman , I didn ’ t grow up with the languages of my parents ( Mandarin , Cantonese , or Taiwanese ) or Chinese traditions . I began to consider my ethnic background as a possible element in my work only after taking a couple of courses on traditional Chinese paintings in college and graduate school and then working in the department of Asian art in the AIC museum , which offered me an intimate , hands-on relationship with a wide-ranging collection of venerable objects . I remain inspired by traditional Chinese and Japanese painting — both the austere , calligraphy-based literati styles and the decorative , highly detailed academic styles that served imperial patrons . Perhaps my background led me to embrace certain aesthetic traditions that are less familiar to viewers accustomed to Western art history , but I approach Asian art as a foreigner . I have heard of but never practiced traditional Asian art-making methods . I think of my accumulative drawing approach as a tenuous analogy to certain artistic traditions — as a method that conveys an inherently distanced relationship . Although I know of the practices and