[BCMA] Nanaimo Art Gallery Exhibition: Reluctant Offerings

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*Reluctant Offerings *
Brendan Lee Satish Tang
May 21 - July 11, 2021

*Reluctant Offerings* is a solo exhibition of new work by British
Columbia-based artist Brendan Lee Satish Tang. In this exhibition, Tang
expands on earlier projects using joss paper: a Chinese cultural practice
wherein paper replicas of objects and money are burnt as acts of sending
gifts to loved ones in the spirit world. Returning to and reflecting on his
childhood home, Tang centres the exhibition on a life-sized paper replica
of a Ford F-150 circa 1984, the year he and his family moved to Nanaimo.

As the best-selling truck in Canada for over 50 years, the Ford F-150 has
gained a certain notoriety. Growing up in Nanaimo as an immigrant kid in
the 1980s, for Tang the truck was emblematic of a culture of
hypermasculinity, power, and dominance over nature and society. The F-150
and its associated ephemera became a locus of both resentment and
enrapture, as symbols of an ‘old boys club’ Tang was not invited to join.
Despite his dubious relationship to these items, Tang has carefully
constructed replicas to offer them as gifts, inscribing them with layers of
value - as spiritual offerings, as artworks, and as meticulously handmade
objects.

Entering the gallery, visitors encounter what could be a once-loved vehicle
abandoned mid-repair or a 1980’s movie set. This diorama, however, is not
made of rusted steel or shot on film, but crafted of skillfully painted
watercolour paper. Often associated with picturesque scenes or landscapes
framed and hung in domestic settings, Tang inverts these conventions, using
watercolour as the surface of an ostensibly rugged work vehicle. The truck
is accompanied by joss paper objects from trucker hats to beer bottles. All
of these objects from the past are shared with reverence, even though they
are meant to be burnt.

*Reluctant Offerings* is the first exhibition in Nanaimo Art Gallery’s
inquiry, *What is progress?.* The exhibition is accompanied by a text by
Vancouver-based artist, writer and curator Vanessa Kwan.


The development and production of Brendan Lee Satish Tang's work for *Reluctant
Offerings* was supported by the Canada Council for the Arts and the BC Arts
Council.

Media Contact:
Jesse Birch, Curator
jesseb at nanaimogallery.ca

Image Attached:
Brendan Tang
*Reluctant Offering*
Watercolour on paper
22" x 30"
2020
image courtesy of the artist

- 30 -



-- 
Dana Gage (she/her)
Marketing & Communications Coordinator
Nanaimo Art Gallery

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