Betty Disco

Cather­ine Y. Hsieh

Segue­ing between paper and oil paint, artist Betty Disco cre­ates a mys­te­ri­ous world that solic­its view­ers to explore the strange beauty of her paper sculp­tures, paper instal­la­tions, and oil paint­ings. Disco’s cre­ations, while com­ing in dif­fer­ent forms and medi­ums, pos­sess a sim­i­lar qual­ity, the qual­ity of col­ors. Turquoise, off white, pur­ple, green, navy, and earth tones per­me­ate Disco’s work. She is skilled at cut­ting and twist­ing paper into imag­i­nary objects that remind view­ers of their every­day life and dis­tance them from it at the same time. Her oil paint­ings, abstract and mul­ti­hued, man­i­fest inno­cent and thought­ful brush strokes. Disco takes great advan­tage of the tex­ture of the two medi­ums: paper, soft and gen­tle; oil paint, creamy and fluid. Both become more ver­sa­tile in the artist’s hands as she wields her scis­sors and paintbrush.

By cre­at­ing unique paper pieces, Disco tells sto­ries of nonex­is­tent cul­tures that reside only in her mind. Organic shapes and nat­ural shades bring forth a fairy-tale land vis­i­ble to the ones with an eye for the mag­i­cal and the fantastical.

With a palette in hand, Disco trav­els through the con­tin­uum of time and space, paint­ing an entirely dif­fer­ent dimen­sion with her oil-on-canvas work. Undis­tin­guished forms and bro­ken hori­zons rise from the sur­face and a pri­vate uni­verse mate­ri­al­izes. One that is full of pas­sion, per­plex­ity, and pathos.

Raw and pri­mal, Disco’s work speaks a lan­guage with an exotic tone, under­stood and appre­ci­ated by view­ers whose state of mind stay untainted by mass cul­ture and pub­lic brain­wash­ing. A pio­neer on her artis­tic jour­ney, Disco intu­itively exca­vates along the way rare splen­dor that lies amidst the sheets of paper and just beneath the lay­ers of paint.

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