THERE WILL BE LIGHT

This is not an expectation. A hope or an idea.      

This is a statement.

Whether you like it or not, whether you see it or not,

there will be light.

This is the concept behind this series of 21 paintings.

Every single one of them is intended to reflect one step further towards the encounter with the light; as if it were a journey to a tryst, a rendezvous with the light and the aesthetics of it.

Even before the journey begins, or the structures of the paintings are conceived, I have the understanding that the light is already there waiting for me, stoically, solidly, inevitably.

And each step taken kindles the light per se.

This is a journey whose destination is irrelevant to the process, but the process is the igniter.

In this process, I have used a combination of intuitive and rational geometry, unconventional color relationships, surface layering, plastic and mediums explorations, metaphors, symbols, repetition, personal narrative variables, meditative dreams, a wide range of both Eastern and Western philosophical content and context, words in lyrical, meaningful and aesthetic sequence, etc.

It is also my interest to link the minimalist synthesis to the maximalist display to express the thin line between external and internal perceptions that is reflected in these paintings, each in a different varied stage.

The idea is to thread together the paradoxical relativity of the opposites and its different stages in a non-lineal or even non-circular succession- something that progresses to become eventually formless with an open edge.

This is the thread of light that connects people together through a keen perception of an image that can be perceived but not explained, and the final purpose is to reach a truthful communication that cannot be distracted.

I have worked with the issue of light for over a decade but the core concept of There Will Be Light became clear to me only about 4 years ago during my first visit to China. By then, I was making a series of paintings called The Bless Paintings. They were small paintings of thick layering of carefully selected ancient Chinese words calligraphed in mixed mediums on wooden blocks. The words were all words of blessing, so that when the viewer saw the paintings they could perceive the blessing without really understanding how.

Then, someone very close to me had a serious vision challenge. My greatest concern was that this person was not going to be able to see my paintings and therefore feel the vibes of blessing.  I had thought that this was about that person, yet this concern led me to my own personal journey to the light.

In the process, I have come to see my own blindness and the meanings behind the experience that hold together my intent, my concept, to the act of painting, as There Will Be Light began to manifest. This relationship between the concept and the very act of painting has become interdependent to each other, to the extent that a new way of expressing my art parallel to my concept has been developed in an unexpected way.

And the light reached its peak when the collective venture with this person both at a tangible and intangible level took place, in such a way that the experience with the light left an impossibility and even improbability of non-manifestation.

In this process, my association with the other, being the one who has inspired me or the one who I should inspire, has been of paramount importance, as nothing can happen without the existence or active involvement of the other. There is no light without darkness, and vice versa, and having had the inclusion of the light or darkness- or the shadow of the light- these paintings have evolved.

Christina Chow