Jan Ru Wan - Thamgidi Website

Jan-Ru Wan is an American/ Taiwanese artist, born in Taiwan and educated in the United States. Jan-Ru Wan has developed her career as an artist using found objects in her sculptures and installations for the past twenty years. Her work embodies the importance of space, scale, and repetition. 

 

Jan-Ru Wan discusses four key themes / essential elements of her work in her overall artist statement. One of the main driving factors in her work is the commonalities of her two cultures, as well as the formation of a new culture created through the influence of both cultures and the experiences around her. Wan further explores the impact of external forces on a person, through her exploration of body, nature, and environment, creating works of art that juxtapose the feeling of the body’s form limited and projected. This idea of scale and juxtaposition is very common in much of Wan’s work, as she plays with balance of such concepts. The most important or notable element in Jan-Ru Wan’s work however is the inclusion and use of physical objects from waste to challenge the relationship between mechanical and organic materials. We typically see objects for what they are, but Wan says that “by manipulating common objects I intend to recontextulize and embed them in different kinds of senses and create a new avenue.” 

 

Jan-Ru Wan has shown the importance and possibilities of everyday objects in the past two decades. Wan has earned spots in over twenty solo exhibitions, over forty other exhibitions, several residencies, and fellowships throughout her artistic career. Jan-Ru Wan is also a professor in North Carolina, while creating art that “evokes emotion”.

 

“Ru Wan 萬珍如.” Jan Ru Wan, www.janruwan.com/. 

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