HCM CITY — An exhibition by Chinese-American Rania Ho and Malaysia's Roslisham Ismail in HCM City examines ideas of "perfection" in a world where advertising, the media, fashion, and technology dictate what people need and want.
Swell Times considers the mixed signals and the underlying conflicts through sculpture, photography, video, and collage works on paper.
In a globalised world, visual information is ubiquitous, but context for the images – where taken, by whom, and what it means – is not always fully communicated or understood.
Without these original contexts, new interpretations are projected upon these images, giving rise to a montage of new symbols made relevant for local conditions.
Based in Beijing and Kuala Lumpur, Ho and Ismail are active and established contemporary artists who challenge the ways in which we understand the signs and symbols that are a part of our daily visual landscape.
Working with imagery he chanced upon, such as advertising for cosmetic surgery, Ismail presents a series of collage works that explore social interactions and status through the machines people use and own.
His work also examines the way people's character is increasingly determined by looks as opposed to ideas and aspirations. The result is a series of comical creatures made up of objects, signs, and symbols that ask questions of the nature of beauty, social relations, and cultural stereotypes.
Ho presents objects and video documents of an inflatable garden made of nylon fabric and filled with air at various public spaces around Beijing.
Titled El Jiardino Aristocratica (The Aristocratic Garden), this series of temporary sculptures is inspired by the connotations of status attached to Europe's highly groomed gardens. By poking fun at our admiration for disciplining nature, Ho questions how ideas of "perfection" are formed.
Ismail, nicknamed ‘Ise,' was born in 1972 in Kota Baharu, Malaysia, and got a BA from the Mara University of Technology in 1997.
He became a conceptual artist whose work centres on his personal experience of urban communities and the culture of the populace.
His interactive events celebrate dialogue and meetings between cultures, while he works with comic narratives and collected popular material.
Ho received her MA in interactive art from the Interactive Telecommunications programme at New York University in the US.
She is a practising artist, teacher, and former member of the artist collective Complete Art Experience Project.
Swell Times, which opened on Tuesday at the San Art Gallery, 3 Me Linh Street, Binh Thanh District, HCM City, is on show until August 5. — VNS