At the Crack of … – works by Bianca Lei Sio-Chong

Tapia Village Cultural Association is honoured to invite Macau artist Bianca Lei Sio-Chong to present her new collection derived from the idea of “breaking”, which is interpreted with “cracks” on diverse artworks, including graphics, photos and prints.  Although cracks can easily conjure up negative impressions of natural and man-made disasters, they can also convey a positive feeling of breakthroughs and the arrival of new things. In this exhibition, breaking and blurring boundaries between artworks and the space unveils Bianca’s artistic orientation, under which the venue has been integrated as part of the artworks.

Curator’s Statement

Bianca Lei Sio-Chong is one of Macau’s most prominent conceptual artists. Her ability to explore various mediums and expand the possibilities of art brings fresh ideas to the gallery space. Here, visitors, artists, collectors, scholars, students, and other interested parties can glimpse the unusual and focus on unconventional approaches in fine arts. Artists like Bianca, with a strong sense of exploration and experimental necessity, break boundaries and expand our horizons. This evolution is seen in the transition from conventional painting and sculpture to spatial concerns (Lucio Fontana), installations (Joseph Beuys), light installations (Dan Flavin), video art (Nam June Paik), land art (Robert Smithson), and more.

“At the Crack of…” is Bianca’s latest contribution to this exploratory path. This time, she maneuvers through various architectural elements of the gallery space, such as walls, pavement, and glass, making the exhibition site-specific. Simultaneously, the artworks touch on universal values related to time, space, presence, and absence. They extend their material transformation from environmental textures to abstract drawings and white walls to strategically dilapidated canvases.

In this exhibition, viewers experience an enhanced moment of encountering art. Whether through cracks, shadows, raindrops, or other tiny elements that exist and occur unconsciously every day, these often unnoticed or forgotten details are brought to the forefront.

-João Ó

Artist’s Statement

The theme of this exhibition is derived from the idea of ​​”breaking”. As an artist, I have always maintained an out of box thinking and creative mentality. Moreover, with the people and things happening in recent years, the idea of ​​”breaking” has become more and more lingering in my mind. From relatively abstract ideas to concrete scenes, I began to pay attention and observe, and even deliberately looked for the “cracks” that appeared around me. Under the natural or man-made factors, most of the cracks in life are due to various reasons opening up a narrow space between parts of something. Cracks always give me a strong characteristic of time — cracks are normally formed over a period of time, and simultaneously they remain in a state of “waiting” to “crack” even bigger again. Although cracks can easily conjure up negative impressions of natural and man-made disasters, they can also convey a positive feeling of breakthroughs and the arrival of new things. At the “crack” of dawn and “break” of day are both to convey that sunlight breaks through the darkness and usher in a new day.

Furthermore, breaking or blurring the existing boundaries between artworks and exhibition space has always been one of my artistic orientation. The exhibition space is just a carrier for the artworks — an idiomatic definition and status. However, this time, this gallery space is not only used to place the artworks, it is also a part of the artworks. Some scenes that have appeared, in the past or at this moment, in this gallery space will be exhibited as artworks through graphics, photos and prints, such as those raindrops that once left on the glass windows, as well as those cracks, textures, marks and shadows on the walls or floor. Those visual elements of the gallery space that were not viewed or even ignored are transformed into exhibited artworks.

This artistic concept also continues the ideas of one of my earlier series of works “Painting is Painting is Painting is Painting?” — the standard function of the materials of traditional media has been transformed, presenting a paradoxical relationship between media and materials. The white painting suggests that the work has extended from the scope of the frame to the white space of the exhibition venue, making it part of the work — painting is a painting, a sculpture, an installation and also an exhibition venue, which all are the art media carrying artistic concepts.

– Bianca LEI Sio-Chong 

About Bianca LEI Sio-Chong

Bianca gained an MA (First Class) in fine art from Middlesex University, London, in 2001 and a BA (Hons) in Fine Art from Nottingham Trent University in 2000. She is currently a full-time lecturer at Macao Polytechnic Institute’s Centre of Sino-Western Cultural Studies and programme curator at the Macao Ox Warehouse Art Space. She is also an organiser of the Experimental Moving Image Festival in Macau (EXiM) and a founder of Art for All Society (AFA).

Bianca’s art has focused mainly on the dynamic relationship between humankind and environmental factors such as place and time, reflecting on issues deriving from rapid urban development in Macau over the past decade, and has explored the boundaries between different media, means of presentation, such as canvas, and images themselves, and between artworks and the spaces in which they are exhibited. She has used a range of media, materials and methods to interpret art.

Bianca has exhibited in a wide range of venues worldwide, in exhibitions including:

• Multi-Prismatic Mutual Views, International Invitational Exhibition of Contemporary Art, Macau Museum of Art (2021)
• The 7th Animamix Biennial－Snoopy 70th Anniversary Exhibition, Museum of Contemporary Art (MoCA), Shanghai (2020)
• The Era of Compound Eyes－RANDOMIZE Intl. Unstable Media Art Festival, Taipei (2019)
• The 4th Shenzhen Independent Animation Biennale－Screening (2018)
• The Taichaung International Animation Festival (TIAF) (2018)
• The Beginner’s Mind－Works by AFA founders, Macau (2017)
• Lost in the Mobius – Taiwan∙Macau, Taipei (2016)
• FICH－1º Festival Internacional de Cinema Chinês e Lusófono and Onde é a China/Where is China?, Lisbon (2014)
• Crossroads × Another Dimension – a Cross-strait 4 Regions Artistic Exchange Project 2013, Shenzhen, Macau, Kaohsiung, & Hong Kong (2013)
• Painting the Space－Works by Bianca Lei Sio-Chong, 798 Art Zone, Beijing and JETLAG－Multimedia Contemporary Art in China (FCAC Video Project), Hanover, Germany (2012)
• Imaginary Belongings – Macau Contemporary Art, Lisbon (2011)
• Media Discursiveness－Impermanent Intrusion－Bianca Lei Solo Exhibition, Macau (2008)
• Myth of Place, London (2006)
• Octomania (on drawing the number eight) at Parasite art space, Hong Kong (2006)
• Microcosm－Chinese Contemporary Art, Macau Art Museum (2006)
• The Second Guangzhou Triennial-Self Organization, Guangzhou (2005)
• 2005 Daejeon FAST－Image of Macao, Daejeon City, South Korea (2005)
• Macau New Wave－Exhibition of Contemporary Art, Macau Art Museum (2005)
• The 2003 International Open Image Competition (IOI) Showcase, London (2003)

Her curating experience includes:

• The annual EXiM－Experimental Moving Image in Macao festival, Macao Ox warehouse (2011-2022)
• “We × Art Space”－Documentary Exhibition (2019)
• “Print ”－Art Project (2015)
• Macau Experimental Video Works, HKEX, City University of Hong Kong (2014)
• Mid-air Journey – Paintings by Lai Sio Kit, 798 Art Zone, Beijing, (2013)
• Study Void – Duncan Mountford Installation Artwork Exhibition (2011)
• Image of Macao－Experimental Video Works from Macao, EX!T, Taipei (2010)
• Fresh Artists－Art Exhibition of Young Artists from the Cross-strait 4 Regions (2009)
• Talks & Exhibition－Video Art Activities (2007 & 2008)
• Myth of Place, UK (2006)
• Airborne system mode－Contemporary Art Exhibition (2004)
• The City, the Community, the Images－Video Installation Exhibition (2004)

Organiser 

Supporter

Cultural Development Fund of the Macao SAR

Art Consultant