Untitled (Ming 2)

In each of Brendan Lee Satish Tang's digital drawings, a traditional blue-and-white ceramic pattern, customary to many cultures, is transformed into a viscious sea negotiated by pairs of contemporary swimmers. Material culture is the ground (or water) that holds us, securing our individual and collective identities. Sometimes tradition offers a zone of buoyant ease; sometimes it serves as a point of departure for forming revitalized, hybrid identities; at other times tradition is like a cloying substance, a cultural projection or expectation, that necessitates resistance.