Wendy Jacob and Jin Lee&
McLean County Art Center, Bloomington, IL
dialogue, December 1998
Phil Smith

The modest size of the installation by Wendy Jacob and six photographs by Jin Lee, currently featured at the McLean County Art Center, belies its richness and complexity. Taken from a socio-historical point of view, the common denominator in these works revolves around our conceptions and misconceptions about gender.

Lee’s sleeping figures suggest that there is a guarded realm of the female personality that is impenetrable even when the individual assumes an outwardly vulnerable or supine position. Lee’s landscapes, as voluptuous in their own earthy way as Jacob’s velvet chaise lounge, may remind the viewer of the popular notion that women are more attuned to the rhythms of nature. Like the gracefully undulating and bountiful fields in which they recline, these figures are also graceful and fecund. Deep in slumber, and at a distance beyond the immediate foreground, they are another sensuous element in the landscape. But wrapped in the veil of sleep they remain a mystery, beyond r; beguiling, but inaccessible.