Working with/Learning from Michelle Chan
Michelle learned to frame her prints, I learned about the Chinese-American experience. #igotmore
We managed to save the finger.
When I saw her work the first time, I was attracted to the energy it contains, how it pretends to be mass-produced pop clothing you’d never find in a store.
Michelle Chan and I started planning our collaboration on the last day of Artist Inc. We’d just spent 8 weeks getting to know each other and 23 other artists in all disciplines, and that day, in the courtyard at the Charlotte Street Foundation campus, we were together with every member of our cohort, each waiting to deliver a 5-minute “Work Share” with slides and video. Michelle was wearing some of the garb she’d designed that was half American Cowboy and half Chinese Traditional. I pitched a photo shoot, and she accepted.
A few months later, she brought a selection of her garments, along with background fabric of brilliant red that reminded me of communist Chinese posters from the mid-1900s. My dining room has nice afternoon light, and we spent a pleasant 3 hours or so making a couple of hundred photos. I like to work in a buoyant atmosphere, and Michelle is a delightfully bright and unabashedly nerdy woman whose confidence in her art shines through her humble demeanor. The more you understand what drives her creations, the more you appreciate the courage it displays, burnished with an unmistakably sly wit.
The more I spoke with her about her garment pieces, the more it became clear how well she captures the ambiguities of immigrant identity. Chinese culture and what we generically think of as American culture are nearly incompatible on many levels. Some of us are familiar with the “Tiger Mom” (one of Michelle’s pieces bears this term in the title) parental pressure to succeed, but experiencing it must be something else. Children of Asian immigrants often bear not only career expectations to win in a challenging American culture, they’re also expected to keep alive the values and traditions that inevitably underlie their family life. Each piece Michelle makes is a subtle parody of two clothing styles that leverages inherent contradiction to materialize the awkward pressure of meeting conflicting sets of overwhelming expectations.
Despite the apparent specificity of her subject matter, the underlying message resonated with me, and my family’s been here for generations. There’s a universal duality of private and public life also on display here, and I feel certain that Michelle’s deep well of inspiration will, over the next few decades, nurture a rich collection of art that’ll only become more powerful as our nation inexorably transforms through increasing cultural diversity.
It was her idea to submit the pictures we made to the Artboards exhibition, and I immediately thought of a couple that would look at home on an outdoor billboard. The display is comprised of two boards facing east and two west at a high-visibility location on Southwest Boulevard. Getting selected was extremely fortunate because this competition attracts a lot of incredible artists. Charlotte Street picks 2 awardees for each quarter, and we are only the third creative duo to be selected in 15 years. (See the list.) I’m not sure I would’ve applied for it had I not teamed with her, but unsurprisingly, she’s pretty ambitious. She also recently completed a studio residency at Charlotte Street. Those, too, are not easy to get.
I’m really excited to see our work in this venue. Personally, I think our images stand out with a faux-commercial hubris, as though they’re a sophisticated ad for a product so famous that it doesn’t actually need the product logo.
Among other engagements, Michelle was recently invited to show in the H&R Block Artspace Flatfile Exposition, and she thoughtfully recommended me to the curators as well. It’s not anything I’d thought of getting into, but that kind of opportunism is part of being on Team Michelle.
In my opinion, this would be an excellent time to invest in an early-period print of a Michelle Chan photo, so if you haven’t perused the gallery, please do so. With new work getting added soon, you’ll find something in a comfortable price range.
And if you’re in the KC area, or planning a summer visit, please catch us on the Crossroads Artboards from beginning of July through September.
Beautifully illuminated artboards in the Crossroads Arts District in Kansas City, MO.