Is the meaning of a book – a physical object consisting of ink, pages, and binding – static? Or does the narrative change with the passage of time, where the book is placed, and the impact of natural elements like weather and insect damage?

 

Artist Jacqueline Rush Lee invites viewers to consider these questions through her exhibition “Whorl,”. A Hawai'i-based artist originally from Northern Ireland, Lee creates conceptual objects by sculpting books, inserting them into the cavities of trees, and allowing nature to warp and desiccate the pages. The result is eerily reminiscent of individual human fingerprints – the “Whorl” of the title – while at the same time suggesting cultural artifacts.

 

Explains Lee, “I initiate chance occurrences by hand, hoping to create a meditation on the interconnectedness and precariousness of the relationship between nature and culture. Traces of the original text remain, but each object becomes a palimpsest – a document that bears remnants of its original text but which has been overwritten with a new narrative.”

 

Lee has exhibited widely, including at the Yale Art Gallery, the Fuller Craft Museum, the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, Hui No‘eau Visual Arts Center, and the Hawai'i Contemporary Museum. She holds Bachelor and Master degrees in Fine Arts from the University of Hawai'i.