I BLOOM by Geraldine Limpo

 

In Bedtime Blossom, my eyes were drawn to the stuffed colourful bear on the bottom left of the composition. I imagined it tossed on the green patch, landing near two other stuffed creatures wearing big smiles on their faces. I observed that another stuffed bear has fallen from an orange string that suspends unfurling from the skies; behind him high-rise structures, a bridge and tower seem diminutive. A blue body of water bisects the middle register of the composition, and I noticed another body of land populated by lusciously verdant trees. The full yellow sun and the white clouds signal a clear day that enables my eyes to revel feast on some more characters in action which include a bright red and white coloured toy plane in flight with two folded paper planes, a flower with a curly stalk, the blue-faced red-nosed toy sporting a green cap that peeps from the left margin and the tail and bottom half of yet another toy on the top margin. I noticed that my face has broken into a smile and I have stifled a cackle as my line of sight weaves throughout and back and forth the colourful elements of the composition. Perhaps I smiled because in Jung-esque fashion, the composition has triggered my “inner child”; that is to say, my mind has unconsciously resurrected memories of fantastical stories that I conjured using the old stuffed animals of my youth.

 

“I paint for the child in each of us”, exclaims the artist Dennis Sun. A positive state of mind inspires his art creation; this is based on his philosophy that artists communicate through their art so then his creation must never originate from negative space. Sun prefers working on a rough surface that he paints on an even coat of black. Rarely basing his composition from study sketches, he applies brushstrokes starting with dark blue and purple pigments straight from their tubes onto the canvas, later progressing to lighter colours. A fan of Salvador Dali who proposed the freedom of expressing one’s subconscious, Sun allows his hands to compose the narrative with the painting brush, analysing composition, balance, movement and other technical details when he takes a break or after completing a draft.

 

A bigger acrylic work hangs nearby. Equally colourful, Moonlight Celebration of Friends struck me as a harmonious melange of otherwise disparate objects such as water and land creatures, natural (flowers, sun, crescent moon) and man-made (children’s toys) that float along with what I can almost hear to be the delicate notes of a child’s music box. On the top right portion, I observed that Dennis has once again included the depiction of the bottom half of a creature’s body; this effectively prodded my imagination to extend the narrative of this blissfully inclusive universe beyond the pictorial frame and explore other interpretations of this composition.

 

Celestial Blossoms is a fine example of a composition that provoked thought. Rainbows adorn the thick and lusciously long hair of a smiling winged female who seems to hover among clouds that take the shape of flowers. Heartwarming images of my beloved mother, dead for almost five years now, quicky came to mind, bringing me cheer. Almost concurrently; however, worry set in as I wondered how one wing can enable this female to fly. I thought: could this be why she has laid one hand on her left chest?

 

A quick glance at Sun’s paintings stirred emotions that resemble those I feel in front of Takeshi Murakami’s works that never fail to bring cheer at first encounter. Unlike the Superflat movement; however, Sun blends and layers pigments to intimate texture, volume and shade, tricking our eyes into experiencing a three-dimensional space albeit through a two-dimensional canvas. His paintings celebrate the potentiality of acrylic to deliver the transparency characteristic of watercolour with the overlapping capabilities of oil.

 

The face of the smiling central figure in Little Mermaid: A Breath of Air peeks out of the pond water that ripples with her movements, imaginably into our space. Sold even before the exhibition opened in March 21, I easily imagined how this visual device effectively established a connection with 21st century viewers who find it second nature to engage spaces other than the physical world (think: virtual) and yet remain feeling alone despite straddling a plurality of continuums.

 

Art manifests its power in the manner it allows audiences to access it and make meaning in different ways—none of which are ever wrong. Viewing Sun’s paintings instinctively made me reach inwardly as I investigated memories and emotions, contradictions and suggestions. For this while, I did not look at my mobile phone to check for text messages or missed calls. The playfulness and laughter in Sun’s creative visualization provided an uncanny escape from my frenetic routine so I could tune back to some me-time.

 

Dennis Sun’s Bloom exhibition runs till April 4, 2022 at the lobby of scenic Kouyama Garden in Nerima City, Tokyo. Nearest station: Toshimaen. Admission, 0900H-1700H daily, is free.

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