Jennie Lau

Downtown Life

"Downtown Life" is a large piece of abstract painting (40”x60”) made up of six pieces of stretched canvas using acrylic paint. Inspired by the architecture and structure surrounding my working environment, the work is about my impression and sensation towards the colours and abstract forms of my favourite buildings and places that I used to visit and frequent activities I did when I worked in downtown Toronto before the pandemic and that I miss a lot.

“In this work, I explore on transforming architecture, structure, landscape and my lifestyle into pure abstract paintings, making lines more interesting and creating harmony with the background, and transforming into a contemporary visual language with a light touch of minimalism and colour field painting. The lines create the abstract forms of the architecture, places, movement, rhythm, and the interaction between my activities and spaces. The work also goes beyond the common visual ideas and expresses feeling and sensations more conceptually than in a representational form. Each canvas can be viewed as an individual abstract painting and be interpreted individually, such as an office partition with light movement reflecting on the wall or table, Toronto Island and the lake in front of office buildings with ferries in motion, an eating corner at food court, lobby, conference room, a presentation, walking in downtown commercial areas, etc. Together, the six pieces form a single major work with interaction and connection with each other, representing the community I am embracing. Click on the Camera icons above for videos.”