A Guide to Nick Lee’s Body of Work
We just finished our time with artist Nick Lee—the fourth resident, but the first of our “second cohort” of residents, so to speak. Nick was our resident for the last 3 months, from the beginning of September to the last day of November, working tirelessly on his proposed body of still life paintings. Read on if you want more context for that work!
Each work in the carousel is ordered chronologically in the order that he painted it in. The blurb about each painting includes their corresponding titles. Hey!— thank you for titling the work early, Nick!
The first piece that Nick made during his residency was titled Still Life of my Parents. It is a still life of an original mid-century Barbie doll and a grumpy looking Japanese samurai doll holding hands on a makeshift beach. At their feet is a toy turtle as well as a pair of shoes which are all to harken back to the inspiration of this piece: The Arnolfini Wedding Portrait by Jan Van Eyck—Van Eyck’s masterpiece. A paradigm that is set up in this work by Lee is a strategy to insinuate a deeper space in his still life set up. In this particular piece, Lee uses yellow cloth on the ground, blue in the background, as well as midday-like lighting to point to the setting as being a beach. At first glance it could be possible that the viewer sees this painting as two actual figures, rather than dolls. Obviously as the title suggests this painting represents his Japanese and American parents respectively, but Lee also mentioned during critiques that the facial expressions of the dolls accurately show that of his parents and their dynamic too.
Following that painting, Nick made a very loud work of seemingly everything Pokémon titled Worship. Even without the title, the lighting being from below mimicking candlelight and the strong triangular composition, this work conjures up the thought of an altar piece. Above the three pokéballs and two Pokémon figurines is what appears to be a hovering disembodied hand. Lee talked about this work during our conversations with the thought of how Americans happily consume a Japanese product like Pokémon but separate it from its source. How they will put this on a pedestal, but have no other knowledge or interest in the culture of Japan. Also of note, Lee mentioned how the hand also resembles that of Master Hand, one of the main villains from Nintendo’s Super Smash series (which features plenty of Pokémon characters). Likening the American crowd as the villain from this game further shows Lee’s feelings on the matter.
“I think I’m at the stage of my life and as a young artist that I don’t have to compromise on my artistic vision, nor make everyone feel comfortable with the work that I choose to do.”
Nick Lee’s third piece American Pietá is a starker, more somber work. The central subject of this work is of Lily Chin holding a photo of her late son Vincent Chin. For context, Vincent was a Chinese-American who was targeted by a group of men in Michigan and attacked because he was wrongly assumed to be Japanese during the height of anti-Japanese sentiment in the United States during the mid 20th century. This photo of Lily Chin is bisecting a full moon, and behind a small sculpture of Michelangelo’s famous Pietá, another depiction of a mother with her dead son. The still life is atop the American flag, with busts of founding fathers turning their back on the sobering imagery. This painting speaks of a dark moment between America and Asian peoples. It reminds the viewer of historical moments like Japanese internment camps, and contemporarily of the “Stop Asian Hate” movement as a result of many Americans’ reaction to the Covid-19 pandemic.
After that piece, Lee made A Call to the Other Side (for Obon). This piece is a more traditional type of still life with fruits and veggies flanking “the main course,” which is usually a large cut of meat or result of a hunt, but in this case it is a fish. Obon is a Buddhist event celebrated where it is believed that ancestors’ spirits visit their relatives again and food offerings are made at house altars to honor them. Lanterns are placed above houses to guide spirits—in this painting Lee uses lantern flowers. This work is a tribute to this tradition and speaks to a larger theme in Lee’s work: exclusivity. Not in the sense that people are being excluded from this work, but in the sense that there are viewers who are going to be aware of the signs and symbols, and there are those that aren’t. The work opens up to the intended audience more readily. As was said with Nolan’s work, for example, there is an inch wide sliver of the audience where the work is a mile deep.
“This is mostly cathartic for my own experience and for little Asian kids who didn’t have this growing up like I did.”
Next, he painted Metamorphosis, which introduced the use of colored lights into his still lifes. The main component of this painting is the Noh mask, which is a Japanese theater mask. This particular mask is of a woman who was thought to be turned into a demon. The facial expression of the mask is such that in different lighting it can show different emotions, hence why Lee included the two different colored light sources that remind the viewer of colored gels used in theatrical lighting. If the viewer didn’t already metaphorically arrive at “the theater” with the mask and lighting, there are two figures set up to look like actors on stage with billowing curtains behind them. The figures are standing beside a cocoon with a monarch wing emerging—a literal depiction of metamorphosis. This painting calls into question perception, and change.
The penultimate piece Lee created is My name sounds like a song from your lips. Perhaps the most densely packed and allegorical work of the lot, My name sounds like a song from your lips is a self portrait in multiple layers. Lee paints a literal self portrait in the mirror. He paints a sort of cultural self portrait in the drawing of an actor by Toshusai Sharaku directly beside the mirror. He paints another cultural self portrait of himself, this time his American side, with the inclusion of the “Lee” brand blue jeans that are being used as a backdrop. (The “Lee” also becomes a playful way to sign his work). In a survey (that I cannot locate at the moment) it was said that a white t-shirt and blue jeans is the most American outfit possible. Lee plays with space again here but in a way where the top half of the painting could conceivably be of the backside of someone wearing jeans, but it seamlessly transitions into background drapery seen in Lee’s other works. There is a hand or glove in one back pocket, and a Japanese paper mache figure in the other. He also includes two small figurines next to the two portraits—one of a cat, and the other of a Japanese figure. This painting seems to be about identity, and the specific aspects of being biracial; how to reconcile being two different identities wholly at the same time.
Find me where lightning strikes was the final piece that Nick Lee created during his residency. It is a painting of geta—traditional Japanese wooden footwear resembling flip-flops. This pair belonged to the artist’s grandmother and is a tribute to his grandmother. Behind the geta is a silky sheet of fabric with lighting on it. In talking to Nick about this piece, he mentioned specifically that he wanted to balance the background of this work so that the fabric looked like fabric, but also like an actual storm and it appears he was successful in finding that balance. This work seems the most personal out of all of them. It is much more reserved, economical, and reverent. This painting is a moment between a grandmother and a grandson, and it is beautiful.
