Destruction of Beauty

I found this very Christian Dior style evening dress from the 50’s at a thrift shop. Christian Dior introduced ‘The New Look’ after World War Two which was a symbol of a fresh and new beginning. He loved to be ostentatious when it came to his evening dresses where he really experimented with mass quantities of fabric. He was also particularly fond of strapless evening dresses where he bought back the feminine look by exaggerating the hourglass curves with nipped in waists and full flowing skirts of excess layering of materials, He said his dresses are meant for the ‘flower women.’ He wanted women to feel like beautiful flowers.

I experimented with using numerous layers of overpainting and spray painting on this dress. Essentially this dress was used as a canvas, incorporated with dried up twigs washed up onto the beach to make it appear as if it’s been decayed over a long period of time.I want to convey a sense of a ‘new beginning’ and beauty through destruction with Christian Dior’s ‘New Look’ that revived France’s post-war attempt to revive France’s internationally acclaimed fashion industry. All these things incorporated exhibits the idea that destruction is inevitable, but there can also be beauty, new beginnings and growth in the destroyed, just like how there was a new beginning and growth after The Second World War.

Still Life (1.3mx1.4m)
Acrylic on wood

After I was done painting this still life, I thought it was still quite dull and I did not want it to be just another still life so I carved a big hole onto it. This is what sparked the idea of the theme of the destruction of beauty. For some time I wanted to do something with the hole as the painting still appeared somewhat incomplete. After the the photography piece Abandoned House I realised that it is up to the viewer to find beauty in the destroyed. I then decided to put a mirror behind the hole to reflect this concept that beauty is all just a matter of perspective.

Rooted
(1mx1.4m)
Mixed Media of chicken wire, paper mache, acrylic, found objects and glass

This piece revolves around the idea that prostitution is an issue I believe is avoided by many as the sex industry generates large sums of money. Living in Thailand, it is even the norm to see these working women on the streets, selling themselves. Many of these women are shunned by the public, but the truth is, the majority of them are from rural areas, many have crossed borders looking for a job to try to make money to provide for themselves and for their families. They have been rooted into this lifestyle to make a living.

This duplications of different parts of the face conveys a sense of a distortion of self awareness that sometimes occur due to series of unfortunate events that happen in our lives. This distortion may sometimes destruct us of our sanity.

Installation of Found Objects

Woven Canvas
Silicone, acrylics, plaster and textiles on canvas

We do harmful things we do to our bodies sometime. We don’t realize how fragile we are, and one day if the tension is too much, we might just snap.

Tension
(0.6mx0.8m)
Silicone and ink on canvas

Submerged (1.6mx1.8m) Acrylics on canvas

The visual distortions of things underwater is caused by the way light bends when it enters a denser medium, such as water.
I decided I wanted to make a piece involving the distortions of water to convey the distortion of your own self image due to unrealistic expectations bombarded to us everyday. To start off I did some watercolour paintings of my swimming pool and water bottle, then some expressive acrylic paintings of water ripples in my pool. I then photographed my sister under the water in the pool and decided to do a painting of one of these pictures. On the right I did an A3 painting of her underwater then decided I wanted to do a large scale final piece using acrylic on canvas of the first photo where her face is partially visible.