Eastside Projects | Jennifer Tee

Jennifer Tee, Local Myths
25 September to 6 November 2010

Eastside Projects proudly presents the first UK solo exhibition by Amsterdam-based Jennifer Tee. Local Myths is formed through the synthesis of newly commissioned and key recent sculptural works. Tee creates symbolic, synthetic, even fantastic installations of great sculptural sophistication with a transparency of production. The artist is constructing a quixotic setting with allusions to a number of ideologically transformative inner structures, sanctums and theosophical spaces. Tee’s sculptural forms lie, stand and hang, interspersed around the space combining unusual elements testing gravity to form a unique constellation and performance of emblematic actions and craft processes.

Interested in the balancing and falling of separated and distinct objects, and how they might develop a synergy with the architecture of the space, Tee is counterpoising two sets of hanging mobile works with a 3.5 metre tall carved carrara marble column - also complimenting the existing concrete columns in the main space. The new column has the text LOCAL MYTHS carved out of the surface and will be a long-term work in Eastside Projects, eventually to be located in a permanent site in the Eastside area.

The hanging works, Falling Feathers, Bit by Bit / Woman Holding Her Balance, and In Origin, all 2009, include hand made porcelain feathers and birds, silicon teeth and mountain crystals which are extended by a new body of ceramic vessels produced in Jackson Li’s Sanbao Ceramic Art Institute at Jingdezhen in 2010. This is the area most identified with China’s legendary ceramic production or “fine china.”

The third major form of Local Myths are a set of hexagonal textile floor works, which may be seen to connect to traditional woven crafts from the Americas, India and Africa, and produced with Sahara Briscoe, a very contemporary craftswoman from the Bronx, New York. These ‘flat’ works provide a space for performative movements recently explored in Shanghai by Tee and represented on Eastside Projects’ billboards and within the commissioned publication accompanying the show.

Alongside her sculptures, performances and installations, Tee has produced a body of artist’s books and printed matter in collaboration with the Amsterdam-based graphic designer Richard Niessen. Often implementing unique or random elements such as hole-punched papers, or multiple independent printed sections, these vivid, layered works are sensitive and responsive to Tee’s sculptural works. On the occasion of her exhibition at Eastside Projects a major new artist’s book will be published as a collaboration between Tee, Niessen and James Langdon, a founding director of Eastside Projects and graphic designer.

Jennifer Tee (born Arnhem, the Netherlands, 1973, lives and works in Amsterdam) has exhibited widely, with recent solo exhibitions at Galerie Fons Welters, Amsterdam (2009), and SAFN Contemporary Art, Reykjavik (2007). Recent group exhibitions include Nether Land, Dutch Culture Center, Shanghai World Expo (2010), Double Dutch, Hudson Valley for Contemporary Art, New York (2009) and the Prague Triennale (2008). In 2004 she represented the Netherlands at the Sao Paulo Biennial.

Eastside Projects 86 Heath Mill Lane, Birmingham, B9 4AR, UK
Contact 0121-771-1778 info@eastsideprojects.org www.eastsideprojects.org

Free Entry: Open Thursday 12-6.30pm, Friday to Saturday 12-5pm

Eastside Projects is a not for profit company Limited by guarantee reg: 6402007, in partnership with Birmingham City University and Revenue Funded by Arts Council England West Midlands, with further support from Paul Hamlyn Foundation Breakthrough Fund, Business Link West Midlands and Future Job Fund. Jennifer Tee: Local Myths is generously supported by Mondriaan Foundation and Fonds BKVB.

Jennifer Tee: Local Myths, Eastside Projects