Tan’s practice of painting explored his fixation with distance and closeness through which he enquiries into the relation between movement (in time and space) and painting. In this process, the artist discovered and began to apply paint on an aeronautical fabric. This a very thin, translucent but durable material does not absorb paint well and hence, allowed Tan to play with paint and their movement across the surface of the fabric. The process of painting becomes much more animated and results in surfaces that embody bodily movement and time, physics and materiality. Elements, such as frayed fabric, rubber, Arabic gum, etc. are introduced to interact with (or impede) the flow of paint, leaving marks that accentuate the materiality of colour. “This painting marks another significant development in Tan’s practice, as he extends his enquiry into modes of abstraction and his exploration of paintings as phenomenological ‘surface-objects’ and markers in space. For the first time, Tan paints on both sides of the translucent fabric surface, presenting alternating views of each work. Playing with the translucency (or opacity) of the paint and the recto/verso of the ground, he builds layers of paint that allow light to pass through, or act as a base for other hues to bounce off, creating shifts in perception by compressing two versions of the work onto a singular surface. These paintings sit individually atop wooden structures fabricated to present them as free-standing pieces, extending the physical and conceptual framing into real space. Reminiscent of projection screens and Asian frame stands, they are arranged in the gallery as space dividers, allowing viewers to physically move around the works in 3-dimensional space. Under the changing light conditions throughout the day, as well as the fleeting shadows of the viewers’ bodies, views of the works are softly altered, inviting us to observe up-close and pause for introspection.”
