Faculty of Art

Sculpture/Installation

Kristi Chen

Nine Fishes

A visual response on my great-grandfather Ho Chat Yuen's observational work of a Koi pond. The eerie, opaque water and the little school of fish drifting around alluded me to create a conversation on how we romanticize nature and escape from reality. This work is not intended to replicate my great grandfathers painting, but to critique his work in the subject of our present era.Fabricating Nine Fishes helped emphasize the concept of computerized technology such as using a CNC router to build the structure. With the addition of the battery-powered fish, Nine Fishes reflects on our present-day landscape Meining describes as “Landscape is related to, but not identical with, nature…the idea of landscape runs counter to the recognition of any simple binary relationship between culture and nature.” The pond shaped by a computerized drawing, robotic fish eerily tapping against the structure, the peptol tainted water all are elements of our human behaviour altering our natural environment and bodies.