A Slice of Space: A Stroke in Time
Works by Dr. Martie Geiger-Ho and Kong Ho
September 6, 2019 - October 13, 2019
Tubbs
Artist Statement
This two-person exhibition will showcase Martie Geiger-Ho’s “Terraformation Series” of vessels along with Kong Ho’s Luminosity Series of floral-spiral paintings. The artist couple were expatriate teaching artists in Brunei for the past six years. Even though their chosen art mediums and styles are different, their contents relate on many levels, such as the source of inspiration of the natural beauty of their expatriate living environment, which is close to the South China Sea, and the richness of space presented in their colorful and textural artworks. They have shown together in the past and they have found that Geiger-Ho’s environmentally conscious ceramic vessels complement Ho’s floral-spiral paintings. The Tubbs Gallery will offer a unique exhibition opportunity for them to share their artistic inquiries in how detachment from a familiar living environment affects their art explorations.
Biography
Dr. Martie Geiger-Ho has created a series of ceramic work in Brunei, a tiny nation in the Borneo island of the Southeast Asia when she was teaching as art professors at the University of Brunei Darussalam. Her ceramic vessels and sculptures are made from local clay found on the local beach in Brunei and are constructed under the influence of the natural environment of the beach facing the South China Sea. She considers all her “Terraformation Series” of vessels and sculptures to be experimental works because each object is fashioned from a small batch of hand-gathered and prepared clay that yielded new and slightly different and unpredictable results. Instead of using commercially blended clay that would offer consistent results every time, she chooses to work in a less predictable manner because she wants to pay homage to the landscape that yielded the clay that is gathered one small bucketful at a time. By touching and experiencing each small landscape area that displayed a different kind of clay, she becomes familiar with the qualities of that place and then worked towards using her precious ceramic materials to their full advantage to make wheel-thrown vessels and hand-built sculptures that resonate back to the character of their original location.
Kong Ho has created a series of paintings in Brunei when he was expatriate teaching artist at UBD (2011-2017). Sumptuously painted in a technique consisting of painterly drips and splatters held in check by subtly controlled washes of glaze and exacting trompe l’oeil objects, Ho’s floral-spiral paintings exemplify the theme and style indicative of his ongoing body of work, the “Luminosity Series.” In his recent series, Ho has created an asymmetrical composition by off-setting the circular shapes of the spiral of the nautilus shell and the floral motif against the angular edges of the squared off canvas. Rhythmic movement is created from a simultaneous growth and dissolution of both shell and flower with the rippling background. A sense of fundamental transformation for which no beginning and end can be discovered evolves from this body of work.
Image: Hyper-real Transcendental Rapture, acrylic on canvas, 24″ x 24″ by Kong Ho.
