Tandem shows by Candice Lin and Genesis Belanger divide François Ghebaly into two curious realms as materially engaging as they are thought-provoking. Each artist’s work is replete with backstories of historical and anthropological purport. Incorporating weaving, poetry, automatic translators and symbolic substances gleaned from a variety of medicinal and poisonous plants, Lin’s installation addresses topics relating to migration and forced labor of Chinese diaspora. La Charada China (Tobacco Version) (2019) features a figure fashioned of tobacco leaves, lying prostrate as on a dissection table and beset by incursions including a tiny pamphlet about mutilation of Chinese laborers’ corpses in Cuba. A glass contraption on the figure’s abdomen distills a tincture of tobacco, sugar, poppy, tea and urine into tubes snaking across walls and rafters. Harboring other objects of intrigue, a hypnotic magenta hallway leads to the tubes’ conclusion in the installation’s eerie final room where the tincture drips over a white tile platform and disappears into a drain as though it never had a purpose. Suffused with a different flavor of unease, Belanger’s installation (detail pictured above) embodies a surreal institutional world stocked with ceramic foods, decor, office supplies and beauty products appearing to have fallen out of some elegantly drawn cartoon gone horribly awry. Manicured fingers become hairbrush bristles and lamps bear lips forced into smiles, questioning ideals of beauty and domesticity. Nearby, the outward face of Lin’s barbed wire fence harbors more surprises and an alternate view.

François Ghebaly
2245 E. Washington Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90021
Shows run through June 16