Artists in Isolation: Liyen Chong
LIYEN CHONG is based in Houston, Texas with her husband Alex so is having a different US based Covid-19 response experience to us in NZ. She describes her lockdown life – “Just before Houston's 'Stay Home Work Safe' order due to lift at the end of the week, we decided to adopt our 14th foster kitten Nimbus, who had ended up stealing our hearts. It was a lucky break for our home isolation, as she has been providing us with tons of amusement! A bunch of library books also got trapped here with me, which is nice as I can never seem to avoid late fines no matter how hard I try! I tend to do a lot of reading before I start working, so this means I don't have to cut my reading short to return a library book. Both of us count ourselves extremely fortunate to be able to work from home. Never will I ever fret about my studio being tiny! I've been working with colour a lot since moving to Houston, and I'm finding that just staring at colour swatches and figuring out how they work together puts me in a happy state. I go for walks and bike rides occasionally. Our neighbourhood is dominated by an industrial landscape peppered with empty plots wended through by an ancient swampy bayou. The rawness of this part of town makes the Houston skyline look like strange protrusions in a flat landscape. It's funny to think of these huge buildings being quite empty now, but then again, I hope no one is currently going to work in a windowless office.”
