Laiwan is an interdisciplinary artist, writer, curator and educator based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Her wide-ranging practice is based in poetics and philosophy.
Laiwan investigates embodiment through performativity, writing, music and audio works, in a variety of media. Her practice unravels and engages in the idea of presence by way of bodily and emotional intelligence. Her work is held in Vancouver Art Gallery collection, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery Collection, and other private collections, and her time-based work is available from VIVO Media Arts Centre in Vancouver, and V-Tape in Toronto.
Early Work
In Laiwan's 1986 slide sequence work, The Mesmerization of Language: The Language of Mesmerization, she deals with language as a structure which has a life independent of its conveyed meaning. There are three parts to this artwork. Part One, titled "OBSESSION : POSSESSION" shows the poem Sappho 31 in both the original Greek and as an English translation. Part Two is titled "SPELL", wherein Laiwan translates the Christian prayer Our Father from sign language into words, deconstructing and breaking apart the text, phrase by phrase, word by word, and letter by letter. "Untitled", which is Part Three of the project, moves from language into images of landscapes. In the exhibition catalogue for Political Landscapes I at Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery, Stephen Hogbin describes Laiwan as an artist who examines the political relationship of geography and identity.
Work
Select Solo Exhibitions
Fountain, The Wall at the CBC Plaza, commissioned by the Vancouver Heritage Foundation, 2015
Loose Work, Or Gallery, Vancouver, 2008 and also at On Main, 2008
In 2016 as part of the City of Vancouver's Public Art Program, the Coastal City series, Laiwan displayed Barnacle City, which was projected on various buildings throughout downtown Vancouver. In 2018, Laiwan started the Mobile Barnacle City Live/Work Studio, an installation created in the SiteFactory bus, which was a part of Emily Carr University's Living Labs Ten Different Things project series. Mobile Barnacle City was installed in various locations around Chinatown in Vancouver. The project also involved T’uy’tanat-Cease Wyss and Anne Riley.
Curatorial
In 2014, Laiwan curated Queering the International, an exhibition part of the Queer Arts Festival, which took place at the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre. The exhibition examined issues of sexual identity.
Catalogues
Kathleen Ritter, How soon is now, exhibition catalogue, Vancouver Art Gallery, 2009
Liz Park, Limits of Tolerance: Re-framing Multicultural State Policy, exhibition catalogue, Centre A 2007
Reviews of Laiwan's Work
Queer Art Speaks to love, hate around world by Robin Laurence, The Georgia Straight, July 31-August 7, 2014 Volume 48, number 2432
QAF extending its reach, draws top talent by Dana Gee, the Province newspaper, July 22, 2014
Digital Art Reflections & 10 Seconds in Time ask audiences to stop and consider by Robin Laurence, The Georgia Straight, August 21, 2012, pg. 33
Writing
LUNG: Toward Embodying in DAMP, anthology on Vancouver’s media artists, Anvil Press, Vancouver, 2008
Ed Pien: Drawing Hauntology feature article in Canadian Art, Summer 2007, Vol. 24 #2