Dip'n Wipe aka Finger Bath /  by Mirena Rhee

An installation where a small tall table is covered with white primed canvas, and lided cups with paint are placed on top.

It's kind of a stranged cocktail table.

The plastic lids are cut with two cross cuts right in the middle so you can dip your finger in paint and take it out but the acrylic paint in the cup doesn't dry up quickly. It's just like the plastic cups for drinks where you could put your straw in.

When you pull out your finger covered in paint you wipe it on the white skirt.

Welcome to the Mirena cocktail hour.

Not sure if this kind of installation could be liberally mixed with alcohol because some might try to lick their fingers.

Emails from Dad /  by Mirena Rhee

As I'm writing my book on my life in New York I'm currently at my travel as a census taker in Georgia. As I read through the emails from that time I encounter emails from Dad. He would ask how I am and tell me he loves me. I read the emails and cry a bit. I know he's dead but his love will never be extinguished, and maybe through this book it will live forever.

Happy New Year! This is how I flirt by email /  by Mirena Rhee

On Oct 28, 2020, at 7:07 PM, Mirena Rhee <****> wrote:

Hi B. great yeah my number is ******, shoot them all over please, are you gay? I have a lot of gay friends but I want to avoid flirting over email:)

You made some fantastic pictures so please send me more.

Anyway yeah sure I personally consider the material world a veil, it is a very compelling veil, but a veil nevertheless. My biggest nightmare are suburban houses with kitchens where people sit around surrounded by unnecessary things staring at objects like televisions, it is the most unfun thing. 

My purpose as an artist is to bring into the material world things from the ideal world. Ideas are the most enduring thing in the history of humankind, where everything else except the pyramids has crumbled.

We're living in a place with a giant black hole in the middle, and we're surrounded by places with black holes in them. There's this anxiety in us humans about the material world and it is totally understandable, we operate in the material world but I am not sure our brains are firmly in the material, maybe they hold little bridges to what lies beyond, at least this is my experience as an artist.

Usually when I crave material things I usually attempt to obtain cash in some way, I try to have it a fun way. Recently I worked for the Census and got a chance to interview people in 30 million dollar condos and across the street at the public housing where in the corner there are all the lookouts for the drug lords in Chelsea. I also interviewed the homeless at soup kitchens, and finally they send me to rural Georgia in a tiny Toyota I drove on dirt roads interviewing people from all walks of life, from trailer parks to wealthy donors to the president.. 

I have zero respect for wealth and big houses but tremendous respect for the human experience. 

Светла ти памет мила мамо /  by Mirena Rhee

My mommy Антоанета Рикева was a fighter, it is now a year since she passed. Rest in peace Mom. Светла ти памет мила мамо.

My mom worked 10 12 hours a day into her '80s. She had two engineering masters degrees and raised me and my brother as a single mom. She fought relentlessly communism, and believed steadfastly in God.

I hope that for the rest of my life I'm half the fighter my mom was. She was also the most honest person I've ever known in my life. She wouldn't take even five bucks if she found them on the street.

She gave everything she had for her kids. She would say it's just money. И също който дава не обеднява. She never took anything for herself. She gave her life for us, and for just causes.

Бог да те прости и почивай в светлината където всичко е перфектно.