Venue: iPreciation (誰先覺), 50 Cuscaden Road, HPL House #01-01, Singapore 249724
Private Preview: Saturday, Apr 15, 2023, 4-6pm
Exhibition Opens to Public: Apr 17 – May 13, 2023
Artist’s Talk: Saturday, Apr 15, 2023, 2-3pm
(Conducted in English, limited seats available)
Online Live also available @ iPreciation FB Page
The artist will discuss his new works with Lee Chor Lin. To RSVP, please call +65 6339 0678 or email enquiry@ipreciation.com.
iPreciation is delighted to present Be Together, a solo exhibition by Justin Lee (b. 1963, Singapore), one of Singapore’s foremost contemporary artists known for his pop-flavoured works with an essence of our local culture.
In this new body of works based on the Nanyang Children Story Books (南洋兒童), travel back in time with Justin Lee as he reunites with his childhood memories and visuals. Be Together will showcase 18 paintings of playful narratives, conceptualised sometime in 2019. In this series, his paintings are re-imagined as book covers as if they are all due for publication in today’s context. Having to rework this topic allowed Lee to expand on his painting language as he incorporates his style into the covers or rather add a uniquely Justin Lee mark on them.
Lee believes that art plays an integral role to help people grow, gain self-awareness, and understand the role they play in society. He hopes that Be Together can ignite the audience’s curiosity and playfulness of people, regardless of their upbringings, and bring out the hidden child in everyone. For the audience young at heart who is just Lee’s age, here’s a pool of collective memories to dive deep into. For the younger audience, who learns the Nanyang Children Storybook for the first time, now that’s a piece of yesterday worth picking up for comparison with today.
About the Artist
Justin Lee is a Singaporean visual artist and designer. Upon graduating with a Diploma in Fine Arts, in 2019, he was one of the selected local artists handpicked to be trained at the Tyler Print Institute in New York. He has participated in numerous artist-in-residence programs in Japan, such as Fukuoka, Studio Kura, Itoshima Art Farm, and Tokyo Youkobo. Over the years, he has participated in numerous exhibitions held in Singapore and internationally (2000-2002).
As one of Singapore’s foremost contemporary artists whose design projects reflect a sense of pop flavoured with an essence of Singapore traditions, Justin’s work reflects traditional techniques such as his ongoing series based on paper-cutting and Chinese woodblock printing styles. The themes and imagery with which he interprets his commissioned design work underscore familiar Asian cultures with a delightful twist of western pop treatment that celebrates Asian values in an endearing tongue-in-cheek manner.
In his earlier career, he was handpicked in 1999 as one of the first six interns from Singapore Tyler Print Institute (STPI) to work with world-renowned artists such as Frank Stella and Donald Sultan in the New York Studio. He believes that art plays an important part in helping people to grow and to see the critical role play and awareness of themselves. His works also reflect on words and images from the mass media like signage, billboards and consumer products which control our thoughts and expression.
The artist’s background in graphic design has greatly inspired his concepts of consumerism. He is well known for his paper-cut inspired paintings with a fusion of eastern and western elements that highlighted how Western consumerism-culture has infiltrated the East and his ancient Eastern figurines modelling western luxury products.
