Joshua Lue Chee Kong: Sculptor/photographer discovers identity in Stay at Home

Being away from home has made artist Joshua Lue Chee Kong reflect on who he is as a Chinese Trinidadian.

That, along with being on lockdown in Toronto, Canada, was the inspiration for his latest body of work, Stay at Home.

He usually creates sculpture-based work, but because there was no access to a studio to make physical pieces in mid-2020, he created installations from work that was part of his thesis while he was at home.

Lue Chee Kong, 33, went to Canada in 2018 to do his masters degree in interdisciplinary studies of art at the Ontario College of Art and Design University. He graduated in June 2020 and was supposed to participate in exhibitions of the new graduates’ work, but they were cancelled because of the pandemic and the lockdown in Toronto at the time.

He explained that his masters thesis was about self-discovery of his identity as a Chinese Trinidadian living in Toronto. He called it Melting Pot: Casting a Caribbean Chinese Body.

“Being away from home I have been homesick, so for my thesis I focused on my own personal history. Being Chinese in Trinidad is a different experience from being Chinese in China. There are different diasporic connections that makes it similar but different. So I was exploring those disconnections.

“I was thinking of my own body and how it takes a lot of your ancestors for us to live in this present moment. My body is not just a genetic connection but also a spiritual connection to my ancestors.”

For the work he did a 3D scan of his body. This allowed him to crop parts and do 3D prints, create silicon moulds, and casts in plaster. He also hand-made various aspects of the pieces.

Since he could not exhibit his work, he created a few installations from it, as well as objects he had at home, not introducing anything from the outside, so people could have an idea of how he was living and the items with which he was living.

He shared a picture of one installation on Instagram and UWI lecturer Dr Marsha Pearce contacted him to do an interview for her conversation series, Quarantine and Art.

The article led to his being contacted by the Museum of Contemporary Art, London, to create a series of images documenting work he made during quarantine for a digital exhibition. He created 12 pieces for the Stay at Home Series, which ran from July 1-31.

“I had basically been at home from May 2020-July 2021.

“Because of the lack of studio access, I thought everything should be photo-based. I had all of this work that I created during my masters degree at home, so it was a nice way of expressing my story – the way I was feeling, the anxiety, the paranoia, missing home, missing the family, but ten times worse because it’s during a pandemic.”

It was also about being a Trinidadian in Toronto and the challenges of being an immigrant.

He told Sunday Newsday he likes to dabble in different artistic media and techniques, so photography was convenient, as he did not need a specific space to work, nor did he need too much technical photography skill.

It gave him something to do during the lockdown and also the opportunity to incorporate storytelling into his work.

He said he just numbered the pieces because he did not want names that could influence what people saw in the work. Instead, he wanted people to think about and reflect on the photos.

One installation was bronze arms holding a photo of a couple, surrounded by fruits and sweets.

He explained that he made a mould of his arms and cast them in bronze. He then placed Chinese characters, usually found on tablets used in altars to honour their ancestors in traditional Chinese homes. The characters loosely translate to: “The world is a gateway to the ancestors.” He said having those characters on his arms suggests that his body is a gateway or conduit to his ancestors.

The photo in the installation is a 3D print of a family photo. The print resulted in raised bumps, which gives it texture, and the necessity of light at the right angle to see the photo properly.

Previously, Lue Chee Kong participated in artist residencies at Red Gate Gallery, Beijing in 2015 and at Vermont Studio Centre, Vermont in 2017. He also had solo exhibitions titled Moulded Memories in 2014 and Paradise in 2016 at Medulla Art Gallery in Woodbrook.

His work has also appeared in several publications, including the peer-reviewed journal Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas; the book See Me Here: A Survey of Contemporary Self-Portraits from the Caribbean; and two of his photographic images appeared on the cover of the August 2012 TIME magazine.

He also attended the Savannah College of Art and Design, Georgia, in the US where he received his bachelor in fine arts in graphic design, after attending Belmont Boys’ Secondary RC School which was later renamed St Francis Boys’ College.

At the moment, Lue Chee Kong is decompressing, enjoying the freedom of movement, and making the most of the reopening of places and the warmth of summer in Toronto.

“I’m taking my time to find a space to exhibit. I’m in no rush. The work is always going to be there. It’s just trying to find a specific space or show for the installations, because my work is very particular in that it’s a very personal series that I hold dear.

“It can’t be a commercial exhibition, because I don’t want to sell my body. I want to be able to freely express these pieces in the way I imagine them and give respect to my family’s story and my ancestors.”

He added that in January 2021 he started going to a ceramic studio, Clay Space, owned by Trinidadian Adam Williams. He is experimenting with different techniques, trying to get back into the groove of creating sculptures, and having fun.

He enjoys ceramics because “anything can be made out of clay.” He never knows how a piece would come out or how the glaze would show, so he is working without expecting any particular result. However, he is sure it will trigger different ideas.

Lue Chee Kong intends to live and work in Canada so as to have the benefits and opportunities of being a resident. However, he said he cannot lose his connection to TT because he loves his country too much.

Even now he feels trepidation about being away from home for too long. His concern is that he would not recognise TT as things continue to change: he said it is disorienting when your memories of home do not match the reality.

From Diego Martin, he said he was never bored in TT, as there was always something or somewhere to explore, and new people to meet. He also loved documenting old houses.

“Whenever I go on road trips I see these really nice old houses that are falling apart. I just wished Trinidad had more respect for its history. You see all these old places disappearing and new glass and concrete towers replacing them. It’s kind of sad.”

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