By Faith Harvey
Shirley Tse, a Hong Kong-born California-based artist, says she is still learning new things in her craft after decades of creating multimedia sculpture installations.
Artist Shirley Tse during her presentation, “From Stakeholders to Searching for Zero Impact Structures,” at UCSB’s Visiting Artist Colloquium hosted by the Art department.
“It’s never too late to pick up a skill, your ideas are the most important,” Tse told a UC Santa Barbara audience of more than 100 people, earlier this month.
Tse closed out the UCSB Art Department’s Visiting Artist Colloquium which featured 10 different artists throughout the fall. Tse did her undergraduate studies in art in Hong Kong and got a Master of Fine Arts degree from ArtCenter College of Design in Pasadena. Tse is now a professor at CalArts in Santa Clarita.
Tse’s lecture, titled “From Stakeholders to Searching for Zero Impact Structures,” described her ongoing search for sustainable art. Tse says she seeks sustainability in different ways, “sustainable in terms of finances, mental health, lower carbon emission, and respecting species.” Her recent move from Los Angeles to the more rural Lompoc was motivated by this research.
Tse discussed her ongoing series “Quantum Shirley,” named for her fascination with quantum physics. In it, she tackles an intersection of political, historical, and economic stories, woven together with personal stories.
One sculpture within this series titled “Superposition” depicts Tse’s childhood. A cloud in the sculpture represents rainy Hong Kong, and a wave represents Tahiti. When Tse was a baby, her mother’s cousin Simone in Tahiti offered to adopt baby Shirley, who was born into a financially rocky, four-person family.
Though it never happened, Tse fantasized about being adopted by Simone, and the artwork springs from that story and her attraction to quantum physics. “I now believe there is indeed another Shirley who grew up in Tahiti and also became an artist in the end,” Tse said.
Shirley Tse’s sculpture titled, “Superposition.”
A two-sided playing card in the sculpture represents the many worlds in quantum physics. When a card falls, the artist said, we only have access to the reality that is shown face up, and the other side gets lost elsewhere.
In 2019, Tse took part in Italy’s Venice Biennale, an international cultural art exhibition. She displayed two different sculptures and titled her presentation “The Stakeholders.”
One of the sculptures, “Negotiated Differences,” features carved wood and 3D printed material, combining new and old technology. “Differences in the sculpture come together to form their fight against gravity, and they do that through negotiation,” Tse said. The wood of the sculpture is carved into different objects, such as rolling-pins, baseball bats, prosthetic limbs, and more.
The wood carvings are held together by 3D printed joints, with no glue or nails. Pieces within the sculpture hold more or less weight based on their structure and position, symbolizing how individuals make different levels of contribution to society.
Shirley Tse’s sculpture, “Negotiated Differences,” on display at Italy’s 2019 Venice Biennale.
“Playcourt,” Tse’s other Venice installation, is about reclaiming public space. “Playcourt” is an outside badminton court based on one from her childhood in Hong Kong. Tse used her sculptures instead of a net, to conjure how children use any material they can to create that line.
On the edges of the sculpture stand two radio antennas which play local radio traffic, conveying the public domain of airspace. The antennas sprawl straight up to laundry lines atop an actual three-story building in front of “Playcourt.” When Tse realized local Venetians still lived in the building, she wanted to draw attention to them. She also created a badminton birdie made of pieces of vanilla topped with a rubber cap. This choice of material is an homage to how her family worked in vanilla plantations and rubber factories before she was born.
Shirley Tse’s installation, “Net Zero” on display at the Shoshana Wayne Gallery.
Tse’s most recent audio-visual and physical art is called “Lompoc Stories” and sheds light on our ties to our environment. Tse presented a three-minute film “Lompoc Story” that goes along with her physical exhibition. The film recounts her experience of exploring her new town.
“The biggest stake we all hold is in anthropogenic climate change,” she said.
Upon moving to Lompoc, Tse made many environmental discoveries, such as seeing diatomite mines, oil spills on the beach, and a variety of wild animals —all non-human stakeholders. Inspired to create sustainable art, Tse found and used natural Lompoc materials, like snake skin, tree branches, beach tar, antennas, and more.
“Lompoc Stories” was shown at Shoshana Wayne Gallery in Los Angeles, California last summer.
Faith Harvey is a third-year UCSB student, majoring in Communication studies and minoring in Professional Writing. She is a Web and Social Media intern for the Division of Humanities and Fine Arts.