SERENDIPITY

 - the faculty or phenomenem of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for...

This year I will be featuring images from a new body of work, still in process. These are mixed media pieces on both canvas and water color paper incorporating multiple mediums including acryllic, ink, spray paint and water color as well as my own photography, found images,objects and text.The work is evocative and intended to provoke the imagination of the viewer. I hope you will join me for the launch of this new work!

My paintings are a continuous exploration of color, form and texture. Lately, I've been wrapped up with blues and greens that tend to look like skyscapes on a larger scale.

My recent paintings are driven by process and improvisation. My initial compositions are informed by photographs of cellular or satellite images chosen for their color and complexity, but I depart from the source imagery as a a painting takes on a life of its own. Building upon material phenomena and accident, I consciously incorporate unpredictable elements into the work. In balancing spontaneous mark making and drips with controlled calligraphic line, I create structure and beauty from chaos and uncertainty.

My palette is connotative, evoking states that range from violent transformation to calm serenity. Building layer upon layer of color produces atmospheric depth that reinforces these sensations by implying history and location.

Partly a meditation on light and form within macroscopic and microscopic worlds, my work is an intuitive reaction to the process of painting itself: an inward search for presence and immediacy. 

In my artwork, I am interested in expressing what I can't express easily in words. When I was younger, I was very interested in poetry and I feel that my interest in the visual arts comes from the same source, involving the construction of a kind of visual poem. Much of my work process is intuitive, or possesses intuitive elements within a rational framework. I am most interested in conveying a sense of energy, emotion, or an idea, through a form that may also have a planned and methodical basis.      Most recently, I've developed a series based on the forms and surfaces of icebergs.  Looking at photos of icebergs and glaciers, I was really surprised by the variations in different colors, surfaces and textures of the their forms. For example, striped or jade-green icebergs, plus the many uniquely shaped holes, tunnels, and cracks in their surfaces.  They looked quite sculptural and some brought to mind carved rocks or caves, while others were curvy and smooth, resembling sea creatures rising up out of the water and possessing a kind of poetic quality.  The works together convey a sense of interior versus exterior, support versus covering, and structure versus sensuousness.  Overall, my recent bodies of work are about birth and growth, variation among similar elements, the structure of natural forms, and a sense of communication and mystery in life. 

The new series 'Loop de Loop' is a sequel to my former series 'roller coaster'. With its layers of materials my new art collection shows the complexity of my artistic life in the United States influenced by a never ending visa bureaucracy. Unbeknown to most Americans, the process of obtaining a work permit for the US can be rather challenging. While highlighting associated emotions in my former series 'roller coaster' in bright colors, contrasts and bold brushstrokes, my series 'Loop de Loop' appears more subtle yet shiny. The use of self made wood boards, stain, paint, silver leaf and shellac gave me the freedom to create a distressed yet polished look. This enabled me to express the contradiction of rationality and creativity of my life dealing with endless visa paperwork to its extreme while following my creative profession as an artist.

The visa forms with numeric codes (titles of the paintings) present a seemingly never ending potential of combinations. This process is cold, confusing and stressful. Ironically, after all the work was done, and the last of six petitions was filed into a four inch and six pound stack of multicolored papers, it presented itself in some comforting beauty.

I have translated my emotions associated with those layers of recurring visa applications and stacks of papers into my paintings by repeatedly adding material, sanding some of it away, then fixing it with shellac just to scratch some of it off again only to add new material and sand it again, repeating the cycle.

My tumultuous emotions of the 'roller coaster' grew into a sense of accomplishment and almost acceptance, which is expressed in the more subtle tones of my 'Loop de Loop' and the object of choice - beautiful roses. At the same time, the color selection of red, yellow and green, represent the continuous cycle of stop, wait and go that is so typically determined by the rules of visa application.

What you see in this body of work is a totally new direction for me.  I've been photographing exclusively in digital media for about 5 years now. The instantaneous nature of digital work is appealing and satisfying. That said, having learned photography in a conventional darkroom, I yearned to somehow get my hands "back on the prints” and experience that feeling of surprise and wonder that only comes from watching an image develop in a tray and the experience of how each print might be different based on temperature, developer mix etc. So I recently began experimenting with a new process to provide me a proxy for the darkroom experience: Hand washing of my digital prints. To create a unique image, I soak and wring the paper in warm water until it softens. I then dry and iron the print, which due to the unique paper/ink combination and the conditions under which it was washed produce a one of a kind image that has almost zero probability of duplication. (Note: The images shown here are photos of actual prints, none of which will be identical after washing.  So please know that each and every print will vary in effect.)

The works shown here are part of a current series inspired by fairytales and legends. Although several pieces, such as "Girl in a Box", have strong political elements, the series is primarily an exploration of visual art as an aspect of storytelling. All story-telling is participatory--you must have a teller and a
listener. Art is participatory--you must have a maker of art and a
viewer. In the moment of interaction between the artist’s act of making art and the viewer's act of responding to the art, a new piece of art is produced, something unique that may only last for that moment of looking. According
to Maya Angelou “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold
story inside you.” That is very true but, I would add, speaking of my
own art-making, that there is no greater joy than to have told a good
story.

Cynthia Tom is a visual multi-media artist, passionate about social justice, women’s issues and playing with the accepted norm. Surrealism is the platform for her ideas to ruminate, take form, solutions discovered and color to inspire.

    A seeker and philosopher about issues in her life, her ancestors and the community of women, she is inspired by dialog with friends and family, forming new themes and stories for her work. Collaboration and brainstorming are her playgrounds.

    Her work has been exhibited at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, the De Young Museum, and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and various other galleries from New York to Washington to San Francisco. She lectures on her work, issues related to women, feminism in the arts and Asian American women in the arts, most recently for the College Art Association’s Annual Conference.

 Cynthia is included in the text book, “Women Artists of the American West”, edited by Susan Ressler, University of Purdue and “Traces of Migration and In-Betweeness: Poetics and Politics in Post-colonial Asian Women Artists”, by Laura Fantone PhD, SF Art Institute ,University of Padua Press, Italy.  Cynthia is currently Board President, Exhibitions Curator and Programs Chair of AAWAA, Asian American Women Artists Association.

    A third-generation Chinese American, Cynthia draws inspiration from divergent

cultures. The resulting contradictions are expressed in a variety of ways. Eastern and Western symbols often share space on the same canvas. Fanciful dresses portray a prophetic wish for people to raise their consciousness and her strong female images evoke a longing for freedom of expression and a life of choice.

    Symbols, cues and clues fill her art, which is described as “Cultural Surrealism”.

Cynthia’s paintings and installations persuade us to look beyond the aesthetic--to challenge stereotypes and traditional roles, questioning paradigms and

encourages our internal dialogue.

Drawing and painting portraits has always been at the core of my artwork. In my portraits I strive to express the passion and personality of my subjects and capture an inner aspect of who they are. My portraits evolve like improvisational dance. I sculpt in color and form, continuously transforming and remolding my image, like working with wet malleable clay. I am influenced and inspired by great Impressionist and Fauvist painters such as Monet and Matisse.