LI SI RONG

Nowhere, Now Here

Nowhere, Now Here

By Amy Stewart 

Here is a collection of new canvases and their spinning, suspended clay cousins by the Taiwanese-born Tāmaki Makaurau-based artist Li Si Rong – the colours cheerful and deep, the subjects familiar but focused. This is an uplifting room; indeed, there are few words that more aptly describe Li Si Rong’s practice, her outlook, and her mission than the word ‘uplifting’.

And words are a good place to start, because this show’s playfulness pervades the title, too. Nowhere, Now Here is both a mantra and a fact. An artful pairing, the phrase contains the soothing reality of the present, and it sounds like a calming conversation one might have with oneself in a moment of reflection. In this way, the title reflects Li’s observation that with this series she has moved from the communal, the focus of last year’s Murmuration, to the individual experience.

The titles of the works form what Li describes as an ‘inventory of what I need’. Home, Grassland, Bridge. There’s another appropriate word: an older sense of ‘inventory’ is not just a list, but a list of what is found or ascertained. Li’s inventory is not invented but rather discovered in the act of recognising the world she has built now and here. The gold she pans for is the stuff of her everyday.

This sense of satisfaction, of contentment, is a profoundly positive message. The metallic flash of gold in each canvas cleverly evokes that moment of realisation Li is recalling and encourages the same joyful noticing in the viewer. Taken more literally, injecting each canvas with shots of gold quite literally makes these ordinary things – a bridge, a houseplant – precious.

Li’s studied, delicate brushwork is its own gilding in a way: she gilds these everyday objects with her attention. In Lighthouse, the sliver of canvas guides the eye to look up, to trace her line from the lighthouse, to wrap your awareness around the objects you encounter – an errant cumulus, a star. Blue Sunsets & Fireworks suspends an exhilarating mid-firework moment against a sublime ocean, the sky echoing the wash of the waves in a soothing synergy of green and blue. Throughout Nowhere, Now Here, gold paint marks Li's gratitude for the wonders of the world.

Epitomising the elation of these small joys are Li’s mobiles. Fashioned from light clay on an armature of delicate steel, each of these is an invitation. Li simply wants each viewer to enter the orbit of Red Door or In the air and look up. This act, she insists, is the same as looking skyward on a clear day – one can almost smell the fresh air and feel the breeze.

The selfhood of this show, the encouraged introspection, does not in any way deny the sense of community Li examined in Murmuration. They are, in fact, two sides of the same coin. The sharing of these luminous colours, these delicate scenes, these soft spaces, is a generous communal offering. Here and now, joy is a necessity and a gift.