September 16, 2005 - February 28, 2006

Philadelphia artist Mei-ling Hom is known for creating sculptural installations that are inspired by her identity as an Asian American. Her cultural references feature specific objects and forms that are traditionally symbolic to China yet are universally familiar and contemporary. Since 2001, Hom has been intrigued by clouds—visually and metaphorically. Clouds have been significant throughout Chinese art and culture as they symbolize never-ending fortune. In Chinese landscape painting and literature, clouds are the embodiment of spirituality and the beauty of nature.

Hom, influenced by her knowledge and experience of two cultures, has created an eloquent series of large-scale cloud-like formations using an unexpected material—chicken wire. Hom has gracefully shaped the chicken wire into ephemeral, sometimes nearly transparent forms that seemingly float. She refers to the clouds as a “landscape-in-space that travel everywhere and are perceived in different ways by different cultures.”  Hom’s constructed clouds are serene, contemplative, and transformative like the clouds of Asia.