ARTIST STATEMENT
My work explores the lived body in relationship to wearable objects. I adopt the concept of embodied subjectivity developed by Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Edmund Husserl, and Lauren Berlant as a philosophical foundation and explore this body-object relationship through the lens of craft, materiality, and performance. A wearable object is often considered a bold statement carried on the body inviting social comment. This can be a statement that expresses status, identity, desire, or even longing.
The ways that the body interacts with the object elevates the statement from merely being about to being. In my work, this interaction is an experience shared with the viewers via performance and video. Specifically, the object I built tends to restrain the body, either physically or metaphorically, and the performance expresses struggle, transformation, or internalization.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Isabel Zeng graduated with her MFA in 3D Studio Art from Bowling Green State University. Her practice is invested in contemporary craft, performance, video, and photography. Her work has been exhibited and published nationally and internationally, including at Society of North American Goldsmiths Annual Conference, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, Ohio Craft Museum, Contemporary Art Toledo, and Jewelry and Metals Survey (JAMS). She has received various awards and scholarships, including the Ohio Designer Craftsmen Scholarship Award and the Ed Honton Memorial Award for Excellence.
Prior to joining the MFA program, Zeng had been the studio assistant of the Woodruff Studio at the Toledo Museum of Art and an independent jewelry artist since 2012. Besides her experience and education in art, Zeng is also an economist. She earned her MA in Economics in 2005 and Ph.D. in Economics in 2009 from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. Currently she is a Professor in Economics at Bowling Green State University. Her multinational and multidisciplinary background has affected both the content and form of her artwork in a significant way.
© Isabel Zeng