‘The Tourist Project’ new participatory installation at Rice Art Gallery

‘The
Tourist Project’ new participatory installation at Rice
Art Gallery
…………………………………………………………………

The Rice University
Art Gallery will present “The Tourist Project,”
a new installation and participatory project by artist Lee
Mingwei, from Jan. 17 through Feb. 24.

The artist will
speak at 6 p.m. Jan. 24 at a free public opening celebration
from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.

“The Tourist
Project” will reach far beyond the confines of the
gallery space as the New York-based artist discovers the
city of Houston through its residents’ eyes. Volunteer
participants selected by lottery will act as “tour
guides” and bring Lee to places that are personally
meaningful to them. While some participants might choose
to guide Lee to popular tourist attractions, others might
elect to visit more private locations, such as an automobile,
dormitory room or café. In this fun, poignant process
of telling and listening to stories, the city comes to be
defined by the multiplicity of experiences to which it plays
host.

The contents
of the gallery space will serve as mementos of the personal
exchanges occurring outside the gallery. Photographic projections,
collected objects, recordings of conversation and pieces
of clothing worn by Lee and the volunteer tour guides will
provide evocative testaments to the artist’s excursions.
The collection of objects displayed in the gallery will
expand with each tour given to Lee in the course of the
exhibition.

“The Tourist
Project” takes the experience of tourism to the extreme.
While many tourists limit their outings in a new city to
a few notable sights, Lee’s excursions with his volunteer
guides will occur regularly over a period of weeks. The
artist’s extended tour of Houston will coincide with
a broader exploration of the roles of tourist and guide,
guest and host.

“The Tourist
Project” typifies Lee’s work in its attention
to one-on-one encounters and its faith in the meaningfulness
of the everyday experience. Lee’s work originates new
rituals in which participants are invited to become more
aware of themselves, other people and their surroundings.
Lee was raised in both Taiwan and the United States and
spent six childhood summers in a Buddhist monastery. Buddhist
influences can be seen in the contemplative tone of his
works, as well as in their quiet insistence on the significance
of being fully present to oneself and others while carrying
out ordinary activities.

Lee was born
in Taiwan in 1964 and now lives in New York. He received
a bachelor’s of fine arts degree in textiles from California
College of Arts and Crafts and a master’s of fine arts
in sculpture from Yale University. Two of Lee’s most
famous works, “The Letter-Writing Project” and
“The Dining Project,” were displayed in 1998 in
a one-person show, “Way Stations,” at the Whitney
Museum of American Art. “The Letter-Writing Project,”
originally commissioned by the Fabric Workshop and Museum,
Philadelphia, invited museum visitors to write letters to
the living or the dead and to reflect on gratitude, insight
and forgiveness. Sealed, addressed envelopes were mailed,
while unsealed letters were displayed to the public and
then ceremonially burned. In “The Dining Project”
the artist cooked traditional Asian meals for one museum
visitor each evening after the museum closed.

Lee’s other
solo exhibitions include “The Living Room” (2000)
at Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston; “The Sleeping
Project” (2000) at Lombard/Freid Fine Arts, New York;
and a retrospective, “Lee Mingwei: 1994-1999,”
at the Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art.

The Rice University
Art Gallery is located in Sewall Hall. Regular gallery hours
are Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursday,
11 a.m. to 8 p.m.; and Sunday, noon to 5 p.m. The gallery
is closed on Mondays and all university holidays.