Journey to the West
Display furniture for viewing stones in China, Korea, and Japan was adapted from existing sources. Ornately carved bases and stands for antiques, serving trays, low tables and the like were the models that stone collectors modified to suit their needs. This sculpture is inspired by the iconic furniture of Mid-Century Modern designer George Nelson. It combines the suiban, a shallow ceramic or metal tray often filled with sand with the supporting table into a single form. The sand of a suiban, which often symbolizes water, is here replaced by wood that has been carved by a computer-guided device into a wave-like pattern. Just as a traditional Japanese style daiza (carved wooden base) might frame an American Eel River stone in a way that encourages the viewer to imagine a mountain range in Japan, so the sleek contemporary tray and rippling mahogany sea advocate for considering the waxed stone from Guangxi province, China, as an offshore rock outcropping one might glimpse driving along California’s Pacific Coast Highway on a sunny afternoon. This “stone that flew here” into an imagined littoral landscape evokes geological formations that might be seen in a Lexus commercial by the stylishly rumpled driver as he glances out the window of his sleek car at the sun setting in the ocean. The title of this piece references the well-known 16th-century Chinese novel of the same name.
SubStance #146, Vol. 47, no. 2, 2018 ©2018 Johns Hopkins University Press and SubStance, Inc, pp. 59-67.