Visual Culture Database Form ARTE 344/544 Spring 2024

Provider: Heather Thornton

VCDB #: 4

Big Idea/Subject:
Community
Major Theme:
Inequity
Medium/ Size:
Fiberfill, foam, felt, felt
balls, cotton cloth,
armature wire,
embroidery floss, Fray
Check,
30 x 40 x 8 in.
Visual Components:
Color, Form, Shape, Texture,
Sculpture
Category:
Fine Arts
Pop art
Pop culture
Non-art
Contemporary art
Authorship: Mimi O Chun
Title of work: # our stew, 2020.
Location of work: Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art
Description: This piece is a large-scale, detailed fabric sculpture of a bowl of
stew and a spoon. It is part of an exhibit, “It’s All Cake”, by Mimi O
Chun. O Chun is an artist whose soft sculptures reveal the
ironies and inequities inherent to a late-capitalist economy.
She recreates icons and brands borrowed from consumerist
culture to create works that vacillate between exaggeration
and appropriation. Mimi works primarily in fabric and fiber.
She uses finishing techniques such as appliqué and
embroidery to render objects with lots of detail.
In this soft sculpture, O Chun uses cotton fabrics in colors that
reflect realistic stew, fiber fill to form the food, and embroidery
threads to add details. These pieces represent the inequities that
were endured, especially during Covid-19. Mimi O Chun creates
works based on capitalism and consumerism; both are social
issues that were prevalent during COVID-19 and are still prevalent
today due to our need for immediate gratification with the
expansion of working from home, ordering groceries online, and
having everything delivered to our front doorsteps.
Interpretation: As I look at this piece, I feel that O Chun is giving the viewer an
inside peek at the realities of how inequities such as lack of food,
wastefulness, and consumerism in our society affect us. Her use of
iconography and well-known brands incorporated into her
sculptures really allows the viewer to see the layers of problems
that affect society and our planet, too. This piece shows the idea of
what we consume and how fast we can have it delivered for
immediate gratification. But how do we stop the waste and
inequities? That is what Mimi O Chun is urging viewers to discuss
as a social issue to affect changes in the future.
Use in Teaching (Lesson Due to the inequities among young students in schools and
Idea and medium) communities around the world today, I would like to engage students
in a food scarcity 3D fiber sculpture project in which they create
three-dimensional food sculptures using fiber sculpting techniques
on recycled cardboard boxes and then glue and paint details to show
how they can help others in their own school and communities that
are facing food scarcity. Students can create multiple foods and add
text and packaging to add texture and dimension to their work. By
having students think critically about how the inequity affects them
and how they can help others in their own community, they will learn
to see that everyone should be mindful about being responsible with
how they consume foods and share to prevent waste.
3-5 Guiding Questions: 1 What message is the artist trying to send using soft sculptures of
iconographic foods and products?
2 Who is directly affected by inequities and food scarcity?
3 What can we do to make a positive change?
4 Where do we see inequities in the real world?
5 How do you think inequity and food scarcity affect your
community?
6 How can we change inequities and food scarcity in your
community or school?
Image Source (url): https://www.mimiochun.com/