From her lead tip flows images of tiny square robots, towering stacks of teacups, innocent woodland creatures, and sensuous blooming roses. These childhood images reside for a fleeting moment on plaster wall before they are whitewashed over for the sake of a new pencil drawn project.These transitory sketches of youth are the work of Sarah Tse, who is of Hong Kong origin. After graduating from Central Saint Martins College in 2009, she has been exhibiting in New York, London, Manchester, Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo, Taipei and other cities.The pencil drawings she currently creates are paradoxes inspired by childhood memories, travels and dreams. She draws an array of paradoxical patterns and images that produce a fragile, nostalgic, timeless, and often disturbing ambience in her drawings. She has been creating works using pencil and paper, the most basic of tools. Through her sketches, Sarah manipulates the meaning of objects, changing the way the world is interpreted.An important element to Sarah’s work is collage. The formation of an initial collage is a brainstorming process for her in the creation of the final pencil drawing. The use of portraiture is a further development, starting with a picture of a face, to which she applies seemingly random images (such as shisha, a naked lady’s leg, a vintage fan, etc), according to the gesture, depth and shape of the features. Even though there can be more than 10 objects on the face, the facial expression of the portrait remains breathtaking. After the collage is done, she will produce a pencil drawing identical to the collage. When both pieces are displayed together, one can feel the erotic ambience of both – through the colours from the collage and through the gestures and fragility of the pencil drawings.Walls provide a canvas that lacks the vulnerability of paper, yet giving a transcient quality similar in nature to dreams- a vital element in her drawings Sarah seeks to recreate these dreams in an alternate realm through her sketches, a world where people escape from reality and remain innocent.
Sarah is living and working in New York.
Read our interview with Sarah about her work here.
