JJ Lee: Combo #1, a Solo exhibition

Wednesday, September 19, 2018 - 10:00am to Friday, November 9, 2018 - 6:00pm

Redeemer Art Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition by OCAD University Assistant Professor JJ Lee.

Through mixed media paintings and drawings, JJ Lee explores the “chop suey”, hyphenated culture that is created when East meets West through immigration and colonization. 

“ReOriented” is the centrepiece of the exhibition: a scroll extending over 60' of gallery space, engaging the 1000-year-old Chinese tradition of hand scrolls. The piece appropriates images of Chinese-Canadian food such as Sweet & Sour Chicken Balls, juxtaposing them with 'authentic' Chinese food such as road duck hanging in a window.

Exhibition continues through November 9th, 2018
Gallery Hours: Monday - Saturday, 9 am - 10 pm.

Venue & Address: 
Redeemer University College, Ancaster, ON, On campus in the art gallery
Website: 
https://www.redeemer.ca/events/jj-lee-combo-1/
Combo #1, Exhibition poster, embroidery on white fabric

JJ Lee: Inventories

Tuesday, May 8, 2018 - 10:00am to Saturday, June 9, 2018 - 6:00pm

Inventories
May 8-June 9, 2018
Closing Reception June 9, 1-3 pm
Capacity 3 Gallery, 6 Dublin St, Guelph ON

An installation by Toronto artist and OCAD faculty JJ Lee. This work will be on display at the Capacity 3 Gallery from May 8 until June 9, 2018. Reception on Saturday June 9th from 1-3pm 

Artist JJ Lee incurred a concussion a few years ago and was restriction from computer screens, televisions, cell phones, reading of books, doing crossword puzzles or listening to audiobooks. However, she was allowed to draw. She started drawing anything that crossed her mind about seeing, the brain and neuroscience, including autism. Contributions and collaborations from her partially deaf, autistic daughter are interspersed in an investigation of meaning of medical labels, identity, systems of classifications, grouping, cultures, and the arbitrary approaches to categorization. Labels are about naming, identifying, systems of classifications, grouping, cultures, and the arbitrary approaches to categorization. In reality, labels do not capture the complexity and diversity of being we all experience. Through this installation the artist hopes to re-create this tension between the bureaucratic structure of labelling and the unsystematic reality of human individuality.

JJ Lee’s work explores the intersection of Chinese and Canadian cultures by appropriating images from a variety of sources. Born and raised in Halifax, NS, Lee received her BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 1992. After living in Vancouver and exhibiting across Canada, Lee pursued her MFA from York University, Toronto (1999. She is the recipient of several awards, such as from the Canada Council, the Ontario Arts Council, RBC New Canadian Painting Competition and the Asian Canadian Artists Fund for Visual Arts. She is represented in the Magenta Foundation’s Carte Blanche: Painting, a survey of contemporary Canadian painters. She is Assistant Professor, Contemporary Issues of Representation at OCAD University in Toronto, where she lives with her husband and daughter.

 

Venue & Address: 
Capacity 3 Gallery, 6 Dublin St, Guelph ON
Poster for exhibition

JJ Lee: “Reproduction"

Thursday, February 15, 2018 - 11:30am to Sunday, March 18, 2018 - 11:30am

“Reproduction"

Earl Selkirk Gallery
2928 Dundas St West
Toronto, ON

Reception – Friday March 2, 6:30-8:30pm

Thursday February 15th 2018 to Sunday March 18th 2018

 

Exhibition Statement

As a way for me to squeeze in art making in my busy life as mother of a child with multiple special needs, a Chair of a university program, artist, professor, wife, I started drawing on 2”x 4 ¾” paper labels (shipping tags) from an office supply store.  I see these stolen moments as meditations. In 2016 I incurred a concussion. The treatment plan involved no cognitive or physical exertion and restriction from computer screens, televisions, cell phones, reading of books, doing crossword puzzles or listening to audiobooks. “Can I draw?” I asked the doctor and she, to my relief said “yes”. 

I’ve been drawing anything and everything that crosses my mind or path: the cup of coffee I was drinking from, skulls, Chinese word cards, autism cells, pencil sharpener, Chinese ornamental patterns, autistic brain scans, the patterns from my daughter’s pants, scientific diagrams, my glasses polishing cloth, the headache medication I was taking, butterflies.

The connecting word to all of these vastly disparate images is “Reproduction”, which can have a biological definition but also references the act of copying from images from the internet or books, or from life. It calls into question what identity is “authentic”. Contributions and collaborations from my partially deaf, autistic daughter are interspersed as we investigate meaning of medical labels, identity, systems of classifications, grouping, cultures, and the arbitrary approaches to categorization. In reality, labels do not capture the complexity and diversity of being we all experience. Through these works I hope to re-create this tension between the bureaucratic structure of labelling and the unsystematic reality of human individuality.

Venue & Address: 
Earl Selkirk Gallery 2928 Dundas St West Toronto, ON
Phone: 
416.901.7464
illustrations of a bird and a brain

JJ Lee and Mei Lee Ogden in “Hurry Up and Wait”

image of multiple faces spliced together
Friday, September 1, 2017 - 10:00am to Friday, December 15, 2017 - 6:00pm

JJ Lee and Mei Lee Ogden in “Hurry Up and Wait”, Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia PA

Curated by Adriel Luis, Curator, Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center

First Friday, November 3, 6 - 8 p.m.

Hurry Up and Wait
Pritha Bhattacharyya, Sanjana Bijlani, Melissa Chen, Yujane Chen, Maria Dumlao, Monica Kane, Caroline Key, Ahree Lee, JJ Lee and Mei Lee Ogden, Hye Yeon Nam, Jermaine Ollivierre, Keven Quach, Yumi Janairo Roth, Rea Christina Sampilo, Catzie Vilayphonh
Curated by Adriel Luis
September 1 – December 15, 2017
Opening reception: Friday, September 8, 6-8pm

Migration can seem like a single, bold act – but the process is actually a series of steps that includes correspondences, forms and often a whole lot of waiting – these individual tasks can be their own bureaucracies, each shrouded in mystery and inconsistency, despite the millions of people throughout the world who navigate them.

Hurry Up and Wait encounters the tensions between policy and humanity – the range of emotions, wonder, assumptions and discoveries that make migration much more than simply a political issue.

Venue & Address: 
Asian Arts Initiative 1219 Vine St Philadelphia, PA
Website: 
http://asianartsinitiative.org/event/hurry-up-and-wait
Email: 
info@asianartsinitiative.org
Phone: 
215-557-0455
image of small artworks falling to the ground