EXPLICATE: REINSTATE | JAMES HSIEH
July 29, 2021 – September 20, 2021
Crossing Art is pleased to present Explicate: Reinstate, a solo show by New York based artist, James Hsieh. Featuring more than half a dozen brilliantly colored textile pieces, Explicate: Reinstate presents works that magnifies the questioning of unsnarling, reconceiving and invigoration. Humans as a species faced an unprecedented cessation during the past one year, one so convincingly baleful, that we could not conceptualize what was to unfurl next. In the midst of the social, political and generally global chaos, nature continued to run its course – without us. Proving to be ever self-reliant, the outer world elicited Hsieh towards introspection, as he examined the enigma that is human greed.
Hsieh is a storyteller who reflects deeply on the vast number of changes in our daily life and uses the plasticity of soft textile and fabric to build miniature landscapes, where something peculiar has been recalled in his memory or just about to happen in the world. For a great period of time, the suffocation human beings imposed on our Earth through impetuous pollution, the reigns we gripped so firmly, so unyieldingly, loosened. An exhale needs to be heard and felt. Nature has shown Hsieh its resilience and perseverance during the past years, inspiring him to find his own peace to carry on and adapt to the new normal.
Hsieh’s inspiration comes from the idea of healing within nature, that would have otherwise taken years to transpire, was attainable in mere months. Once he realizes that humans have endured rigorous and stringent restrictions and fared well, the question arises: should we plunder and exploit wildlife to sustain our own lives? Hsieh answers this question in his extremely soft but strong works. As the outside world thrived and glistened all around us, we turned to it, seeking commiseration, inventiveness, solace and lucidity.
These are not small knick knacks with the texture of different fabrics, but assured and willful entities. The large tufted tapestry plays an important role in this exhibition as the artist’s desire and urge to invite nature inside our domestic space, blurring the boundary of the indoor and outdoor spaces and blending in with nature. Hsieh examines and explores elective material skills to realize his plan for textile paintings – he found tufted tapestry. Once this skill was concretized, Hsieh decided to develop a series of textile paintings that pairs with his sculpture work. Subsequently, he consolidated the tapestry technique with his soft sculptures to create three new paintings. Each piece in this show manifests a narrative about nature’s seamless resume while our reality took a momentous interval.Those works also extend as context to the background and environment, a place where Hsieh’s imaginary figures inhabit. The frame suggests a window, one that has become mentally imperative as an invisible and vital connection to the outside world.