A solo exhibition by Rachel Lee Zheng, who graduated in 2016, opened on Feb. 10 at FiveMyles Gallery in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
Zheng’s site-specific installation, (un)obscured echoes, is an “immersive environment that lures viewers into an experiential space for subjective reflection by temporarily removing us from the distractions of a fast-paced, digital society,” according to the gallery statement. The show is open through March 11.
“With (un)obscured echoes installed in a space without any natural light, I am able to control light as a primary material in the work with the placement of colored LED spotlights to highlight the created physical form, disorienting viewers’ visual perception of space and light,” Zheng said.
As a rising junior in 2015, she received a Kaempfer Summer Art Grant that prompted an interest in the California Light and Space movement of the 1960s. To continue this work, she received a Grua/O’Connell Research Award in 2015 to work on an independent study in the visual arts, with support from Jackie Brown, who is Bowdoin’s Marvin H. Green, Jr. Assistant Professor of Art, and Peggy Wang, assistant professor of art history and Asian studies. In 2016, Zheng received the Richard P. Martel Jr. Memorial Prize from Bowdoin’s visual arts faculty, which is annually given to students who “are deemed to have produced the most creative, perceptive, proficient, and visually appealing art works exhibited at the College during the academic year.”
At the moment, Zheng, who grew up in Los Angeles, is living in midcoast Maine and working as the curatorial and communications assistant for the Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockland. This summer, she will be published in Studio Visit Magazine and be featured in an exhibition at Steel House Projects Gallery in Rockland.
