FORBIDDEN ZONE Works by Le Guo and Jonathan Roson

The paintings of Le Guo and the sculptures of Jonathan Roson are products of organic geometrical processes which depend not only on the different modes of sensory perception of their bodies of the unambiguous (i.e. explicit and literal) and ambiguous (i.e. implicit and metaphorical) processes and events taking place in their multisensory perceptions of the sensible world; but also on the individual (mental and bodily sensory) and collective (cultural) memory-images they derive from both these different modes of perception and their diasporic experiences. The processes of production of such a mythopoetic artwork may be conceived in terms of life-cycles in which the geometrical figures of the organic shapes and forms of an ‘artificial life’ that was previously unknown – and therefore ‘alien’ – to the artist become known, only to become partially/totally unknown to him again as these figures are partially/totally replaced by other geometrical figures which were previously unknown to him. Le Guo and Jonathan Roson use their artworks to explore the unstable boundary distinctions between the human ‘subjective self’ and the non-human ‘objective other’ materials of Nature with which they conjointly produce these artworks. A viewer of such an artwork may experience both an enhanced/impaired distinction between his/her ‘self’ and the profane/sacred ‘other’ figures in a (sub)liminal ‘zone’ of perception that was previously forbidden to him/her; and a dynamic balance between the unstable states of ‘discordant harmony’ and ‘harmonious discord’ in this artwork that encourage this viewer to attribute mysterious, enigmatic and unfixed meanings to it. (text © Stephen Baycroft)