Lap-See Lam »Tales of the Altersea (Prologue)«

The tales of the Altersea, as told by the artist, centre around the 'Sea Palace', a dragon-shaped, three-story floating restaurant, now repurposed as a haunted house in the Gröna Lund amusement park. The ship had sailed from Shanghai to Europe in the early 1990s, when the business had to transform due to economic losses in various cities. Its journey and aesthetic, anchored in a historic reality, inform the artist’s fictional narrative and materialise in the works on display in this exhibition. When entering the gallery, the visitor is met by 'Dahlia' (2023), a ghostly green neon sculpture floating underneath the ceiling. Lam’s underwater tales feature 'Dahlia' and her sister 'Julie' as the protagonists, who swim toward the wreck of the 'Sea Palace' while encountering a complex entanglement of symbolic figures, monsters, and ghosts, that separate them. When the sisters finally reunite, they resurrect a dragon spirit and escape from the decaying ship.
Continuing into the main gallery space, 'Dahlia' introduces the 'Portal' (2023), a sculpture and shadow play that depicts two dragons chasing a flaming pearl and recall the 'Sea Palace’s' ornaments. The entire gallery space is softly darkened with curtains, while further neon sculptures such as 'Stern', 'Bow', and 'Starboard' (all 2023) glimmer on the walls enlivened by the dragon shadows, all tracing the dragon head and tail of the 'Sea Palace'. 'Julie' (2023), a kinetic sculpture, calls attention to herself with subtle swimming movements, now half dragon escaping to safety. In these works, Lam delves into almost magical imaginations of Chinoiserie, defined by imperialist trading, while reflecting on the reality of migration to both claim ownership of and complicate the idea of cultural heritage – a duality that characterises the artist’s mythical installations.

The second room of the gallery, separated with a narrow curtain, allows entrance to her seminal VR-installation Phantom Banquet (2019-20). Viewers are invited to family-style sit at a round dinner banquet to be transported to another reality via VR-glasses. With a narrative about a girl with ghostly encounters, Lam guides through an architecture of a real-life Chinese restaurant represented only by its shell and marked by 3D-scan glitches to reveal hidden histories and possible futures.

Lap-See Lam was born in Stockholm in 1990, where she lives and works. The artist has been invited to create the idea and framework for a Gesamtkunstwerk at the Nordic Countries Pavilion for the 60th Venice Biennial, opening in 2024. Working alongside her are the artist Kholod Hawash from Finland and the composer Tze Yeung Ho from Norway. Her work is currently showing at the Buffalo AKG Art Museum, Buffalo NY. Recent solo exhibitions include the Swiss Institute, New York City; Portikus, Frankfurt am Main; and Lidköping Konsthall, Sweden (all 2023); Bonniers Konsthall (2022); Trondheim Kunstmuseum (2021); Moderna Museet Malmö (2018–2019); and Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm (2022, 2018). 'Tales of the Altersea' is currently on view at Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki as part of the Ars Fennica 2023 exhibition. She has taken part in group exhibitions at venues including Ghost 2565, Bangkok (2022); KINDL – Centre for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2022); Power Station of Art, Shanghai (2021); PinchukArtCentre (2021); Uppsala Konstmuseum (2020); Performa 19 in New York (2019); Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain, Paris (2019); Luleå Biennial (2018); Kópavogur Art Museum, Kópavogur (2018); and Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen (2017). Lam was the winner of Dagens Nyheter Culture Prize in 2021 and a recipient of the Maria Bonnier Dahlin Foundation Grant in 2017. In 2021 she was shortlisted for the Future Generation Art Prize. She is nominated for the Ars Fennica Award 2023.

Lap-See Lam presents her work 'Dreamers' Quay (Singing Chef Suits): The Three Jugglers, The Teenager A'Yan, Afock' 2022 at Studio Mondial as part of the Gallery Weekend Festival from September 16–17.

The VR installation 'Phantom Banquet' (2019-2020) was commissioned by Performa 19.