Linda Nguyen Lopez
INSIDERS / MEDIATORS
© Linda Nguyen Lopez, photo by Meredith Mashburn.
Linda Nguyen Lopez’s sculptural lamps double as furniture, inviting us to sit under the warm glow of a hand-blown lightbulb to rest, meditate, and dream. These pieces represent a marked departure in scale and function for the artist from the tabletop objects she is best known for—lumpy and furry sculptures inspired by making friends with dust bunnies and other household items as a child growing up in an immi- grant home without a shared language. Her mother’s anthropomorphization of the domestic realm left a lasting impact on how Lopez approaches object-making. The lamps symbolize a respite for the artist’s complex emotions over a lifetime of making sense of her mixed identity while continuing her playful pursuit of animating the inanimate with a touch of humor.
The two-in-one sculptures’ cloud-like appearance and exposed wiring running upwards make for an illusion of airiness—as if they could float away—that belies their sturdy composition. She adorns their amorphous bodies through a labor-in- tensive process of hand-cutting tiles into shapes found in textiles from her Vietnamese and Mexican heritage and puzzling them into sparkling, ombré candy-colored formations.
B. 1981, Visalia, CA
Lives and works in Fayetteville, AR
lindalopez.net
@linda_lopez
FL592
Linda Nguyen Lopez, Floating Ground, 2021, Earthenware, porcelain, epoxy, grout, lamp parts, and bulb. Courtesy of the artist, photo by R & Company.