The Arts in NYC Fall 2012

Over the weekend I went to the Chelsea Piers exhibits with a couple of my friends and walked through the many galleries there. One of the exhibits really stood out to me. “Badges” by Lin Tianmiao consisted of enlarged embroidered sewing circles that hung from the ceiling. Each circle had one word that a woman may be called sewed onto it in Chinese and English. Among the words were “foxy,” “career girl,” “bimbo,” “armcandy,” and “honey sweetheart.” They were all oriented different ways and turned as you walked through them. In addition to this, there was a recording that played of a strange voice saying all the words that appeared around us.

I think Tianmiao was trying to make a statement about the labels placed on women in todays day and age. She seems like an artist who gets her inspiration from challenges women face and also her Chinese culture. The recording added an eerie feeling to the work, which was kind of cool. The overall exhibit was fun and different, while also making a powerful statement. Her style is unique and has a common “thread;” she uses a lot of embroidery in her work, maybe to emphasize the theme of women even more. I looked up Lin Tianmiao briefly and I found that she uses thread in her work a lot, something she learned from her grandmother. She makes a lot of statements about women in Chinese culture, and even uses her own image in her work. Her roots are clearly a big influence in her art. She also sculptures bones often in her exhibits, and accompanies visual works with recordings. I would like to see more of Lin Tianmiao’s art in the future to see how the themes she uses carries over to the different ideas she has.