EPISODIC MEMORIES

STEPPING INTO A studio is an entry into a private space; where its landscapers, the artists, divulge the inner recesses of their minds. Phunk studios’s Transmission: Visions & Memories is an exploration of that theme by eight different artists.

It is often said that art reflects one’s own being; and without asking the artist, one figures out the message in his own way. The use of multiple mediums to dredge memories up from the depths of their patrons is an interactive way for the artists to engage and explore the theme of the exhibit.

An inverted pyramid, the semblance of a jaw, with a tooth right at the bottom initially inspired memories of innocence and new birth, and the guiltless belief in the tooth fairy. Its creator, Ying Xian, had amalgamated three of her memories, all to do with various degrees of loss.

The jaws were interlocked; and it was her personal view that all her bad memories were similarly interlocked, threatening to break her fragile self. Art for Ying Xian has been a form of escape in an interlocked world- as to other artists, their medium serves the same purpose.

The personal exploration by Ying Xian was juxtaposed against that of Odelia’s, which was the exploration of thought creation. An exhibit that cleverly excited the senses, it required one to smell specifically crafted scents while looking at sketches that reminded one of Rorschach’s ink blots. From bed sheets to the caustic smell of burned rubber to the dark aroma of firewood; the array of smells was an awakening and a reminder of memories gone past. It was a new way of revisiting memories, speaking the unspoken through the words these pieces brought across to its transitory viewers.