CHRISTINE AY TJOE

With the Let Me Come Out series, Ay Tjoe continues her explorations of self. She interrogates our understanding of consumption and questions our complex relationship with food that shapes our identity and societal values. Her spontaneous and free ranging approach to the print medium, with her lines, aggressive and intense, reveal monstrous, skull-faced figures called 'mental monsters'. They feed on our desire for excessive consumption, but they can be subdued with a mind as disciplined as the artist's, able to manage one's superfluous desires. The monster is a creature of our times, made to multitask holding a newspaper while digging into a meal - not a scene far from reality.The strong line work in this lot, Let Me Come Out #103 (Lot 2390) is revealed through her ability to vary the emotional intensity of her lines as she taps on her body and spirit, and not just her consciousness, to create the image of the monster. The vague outlines that hint at this shape also reveal a sort of inner struggle as the lines that on a chaotic dynamism and energy with her etching.