{"id":474,"date":"2021-05-13T13:06:25","date_gmt":"2021-05-13T17:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/visual-arts-3902-spring-2021\/?page_id=474"},"modified":"2021-05-15T08:28:48","modified_gmt":"2021-05-15T12:28:48","slug":"calla-chan","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/visual-arts-3902-spring-2021\/calla-chan\/","title":{"rendered":"Calla Chan"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Calla<\/a>Major: Environmental Studies and Visual Arts
\nGraduation Year: 2021<\/p>\n

Biography<\/h3>\n

Calla Chan is an artist from Hong Kong working in digital media, painting, and drawing. She intends to graduate from Bowdoin College \u201921 with a BA in Environmental Studies and Visual Arts. Her artistic practice focuses on the visualisation of ecofeminism. With a love for nature and art, she has continued to navigate different avenues of expressing the human relationship to nature. In exploring the intersections of science and art, she has also discovered a new passion for digital media where she overlays her paintings and photographs with digital drawings.<\/p>\n

click on images for enlarged slideshow<\/em><\/p>\n

\"1.<\/a>
Cyan Irises, watercolour and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"2.<\/a>
Calla Lily, water colour and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"3.<\/a>
Light Hydrangeas, water colour and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"4.<\/a>
Wisteria, water colour on paper, 9 x 12\u201d, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"5.<\/a>
Light Iris, water colour and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"6.<\/a>
Peach Sunset, photograph and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"7.<\/a>
Gradient Sunset, photograph and digital drawing, 2021<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Artist Statement<\/h3>\n

My most recent work explores the visual representation of ecofeminism. Some of my pieces are purely watercolour on paper, and others are digital drawings over photographs of my watercolour paintings or photographs I took of nature\u2014combining traditional to contemporary methods of art. By working with watercolour, I am able to understand the limitations past female artists had when working in this medium, and by working with digital media, I am able to explore a future of sustainable studio art.<\/p>\n

In my work, I seek to investigate the intrinsic relationship between nature and the female body. I was captivated with Maria Sybilla Merian\u2019s scientific studies of florae in the late 17th<\/sup> century and how she captures the metamorphosis of plants. I was also deeply inspired by Georgia O\u2019Keeffe\u2019s floral paintings and intrigued by critics linking her work to female genitalia. In life, we subconsciously anthropomorphize the unknown in order to understand and relate to them. Through my art, I want to address parallels between the beauty of nature and the female body while simultaneously reclaiming the connection that women have to the earth. My work seeks to visually reveal the underlying relationship between nature and the female body.<\/p>\n

Curatorial Statement<\/h3>\n

Both nature and women\u2019s bodies, so often violated and neglected, are illuminated for their shared strength and resilience in Calla Chan\u2019s recent work. Chan begins by painting flowers with watercolor on paper, allowing petals to sweep across the page and grow into the space that they require. After documenting the finished watercolors or photographing the natural world around her, Chan digitally layers minimalistic tracings of women\u2019s bodies on top of each flower and natural scene, finding and illustrating the organic patterns between imagined bodies and nature. The petal of an iris echoes the curve of a woman\u2019s back or the profile of a head; and a lily\u2019s leaf takes the shape of a woman\u2019s legs. Each piece is delicate, gentle, and soft while also asserting power – a reclamation of both nature and women\u2019s own bodies.<\/p>\n

Chan\u2019s eco feminist ideals ground and drive her work. She compels the viewer to slow down, follow their curiosity, and spend time searching for the tangible and intangible parallels between femininity and the environment. Chan\u2019s own exploration of these parallels is clear with her pursuit of environmental justice in both content and the art-making process, constantly searching to make her practice more sustainable. Chan cites Georgia O\u2019Keeffe\u2019s exquisite floral paintings as inspiration; however, while O\u2019Keeffe is adamant that her flowers are not meant to symbolize women\u2019s genitalia, I appreciate that Chan is direct in the explicit connection between her flowers and women\u2019s bodies.
\n–Bianca Allende Boyd<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Major: Environmental Studies and Visual Arts Graduation Year: 2021 Biography Calla Chan is an artist from Hong Kong working in digital media, painting, and drawing. She intends to graduate from Bowdoin College \u201921 with a BA in Environmental Studies and Visual Arts. Her artistic practice focuses on the visualisation of ecofeminism. 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