The Estate of Rose Finn-Kelcey
Sad and Lonely (set meal for one), 2006
wood, paint, aluminium, fairground lights, sequencer, scaffolding
740 x 370 x 150 cm
Historically the Chinese restaurant has been our main point of contact with Eastern culture. But now it is removed. It is held aloft — a symbol at once of its...
Historically the Chinese restaurant has been our main point of contact with Eastern culture. But now it is removed. It is held aloft — a symbol at once of its importance and its distance. Its windows cast a cold brightness, like a lighthouse beam sweeping the gloom. But what is it signalling?
It was while sitting in one of these restaurants that Finn-Kelcey came up with the idea for a third work, Sad and Lonely, the name of the “set meal for one” on a menu she was given. Now she represents the words like fairground lights flashing gaily across the front of a stall. But there is nothing beyond the merry façade. Humour and melancholy meet like light and darkness.
This is an artist who plays with the power of language, who likes to explore its shifting meanings in unexpected contexts.
- Rachel Campbell-Johnston, The Times, 5 December 2006
It was while sitting in one of these restaurants that Finn-Kelcey came up with the idea for a third work, Sad and Lonely, the name of the “set meal for one” on a menu she was given. Now she represents the words like fairground lights flashing gaily across the front of a stall. But there is nothing beyond the merry façade. Humour and melancholy meet like light and darkness.
This is an artist who plays with the power of language, who likes to explore its shifting meanings in unexpected contexts.
- Rachel Campbell-Johnston, The Times, 5 December 2006