Looking at Yin’s process of carving granite through Rob Whittlesey’s film.
About the film maker:
“Rob Whittlesey has been making critically acclaimed, award-winning documentary films for more than 40 years. His tools have evolved from 16mm film to high-definition digital, but what has not changed is his passion for telling real people’s stories in a visual and memorable way. Among the two dozen films he has produced and directed for PBS, five received National News & Documentary Emmy nominations. Others have won top prizes at festivals and competitions including Wildscreen, the Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival, and the Explorers Club Film Festival.
Now semi-retired, Rob’s love of filmmaking keeps him looking for good stories and engaging characters. And that is what he found when he met Yin Peet.”
“YIN PEET CARVES”
Yin’s Word in Art
In 1991, at my MFA thesis exhibition, I presented a large sculptural installation titled The Game. It traced my life from the day I was born to the opening of the exhibition through a symbolic game board whose positions changed over time.
Looking back, I realize it already contained many of the questions that would guide my work for the next unknown number of years.
That exhibition led an museum curator to visit my studio. I proudly arranged my sculptures to show the direction of my thinking. She looked around and said, “This studio looks like ten artists are working here.” At first I thought it was a compliment. Later I understood that she meant my work lacked a recognizable style, needless to say, she never offered me an exhibition.
More than thirty years later, looking back to my art journey I see that my sculptures were consistently exploring philosophical questions through different forms and material, rather than trying to solve a single visual problem. I was not searching for a recognizable style, but for a recognizable way of thinking. I have never thought of sculpture as simply carving stone, welding steel, building monumental fiberglass forms, or even performing its making. For me, sculpture is a way of exploring what it means to be human, in society or above society.
Growing up in Taiwan, I was deeply influenced by Chinese philosophy and Zen Buddhism. Living and working in the United States introduced me to the Western tradition of figurative sculpture.
Rather than choosing one tradition over the other, my work has become a lifelong conversation between them. I rarely begin with a message I want to deliver. More often, I begin with a question I cannot answer.
Can a still object/sculpture express the passage of time?
Can sound explicits the primary traits in human figurative sculpting?
Can discussion of philosophy be visualized in stone?
Can a simple gesture reveal compassion, struggle, and hope?
Can artists work together in a piece of artwork that celebrates individuality?
Every question has led to a series of sculptures exploring its possibilities. Growing out of this curiosity, Hundreds of sculptures have gradually paved my path toward one colossal question: How can sculpture reveal the invisible dimensions of human life?
This search has led me to work in many forms—from miniature seal stone carvings and monumental granite sculptures to performance, sound, and collaborative projects. Each medium offers a different language, but they all serve the same purpose: to explore ideas that cannot be expressed through words alone.
One belief has gradually become central to my work: transformation.
I often say that sculpture is not a three-dimensional art but a four-dimensional one. Less obvious than a Happening in Performance art, a still sculpture could also unfolds its full meaning through time as the viewer completes viewing around it. No single viewpoint tells the whole story. The complete sculpture exists only through a full 360-degree experience, where the viewer becomes an active participant in discovering its meaning.
That belief eventually extended beyond individual sculptures.
Starting 2003, together with my artistic partner, Viktor Lois, we transformed an abandoned granite quarry into the YV Art Museum—a place where artists from around the world continue to carve, collaborate, perform, and leave their work for future generations. To me, sculpture is not simply an object to be displayed. It is a living experience that connects people, cultures, ideas, music, technology and time.
I have studied with many masters in the art history book, Dali, Rembrandt, Picasso, Monet, DaVinci, to name a few; but over time, I discovered that I became my own most important teacher.
Looking back over forty years, I realize that most of my ideas did not come from outside inspiration. They grew naturally from the unanswered questions left behind by the sculpture I had just completed. Each sculpture answered one question while revealing another.
Every sculpture I have created is another move on that game board.
The museum itself may be the largest move yet.
