Cather­ine Y. Hsieh

Gao Yi Lei’s vibrant palettes bring marine crea­tures back to life in his oil-on-canvas series The Times of Ke Long. A lob­ster in green and royal blue seems to be jump­ing off from the can­vas sur­face against a back­drop of vast oceanic blue while in another piece a dark pur­ple octo­pus wags its ten­ta­cles in remark­able energy with shades of crim­son explod­ing in its cen­ter con­trasted with an atmos­pheric back­ground of power blue. Gao paints exquis­ite gold fish in another piece with care­free brush­strokes and unex­pected hues. The lit­tle gold fish come in rain­bow col­ors: fiery red, pas­sion­ate orange, fleshy pink, with splashes of lime and sea foam blue. The move­ment of the tail as the fish swim across the can­vas com­ple­ments the flu­id­ity of the paint­ing as the grace­ful beings mate­ri­al­ize vividly in the con­trast between neg­a­tive space and pos­i­tive space. Seem­ingly a lover for nature, espe­cially sea life, Gao man­ages to recre­ate the world under the sea in a tone that is serene and effer­ves­cent at the same time.