Lot 22

Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney
Private collection, Melbourne

Lindy Lee's "Birth and Death" series 2007 extends on ideas first developed in "Birth and Death" 2003, which comprised of approximately 100 concertinaed Chinese accordion books arranged in rows. These folded books, traditionally used for Buddhist texts, carry layered cultural associations within the work.

They suggest, on one hand, the accordion instrument, widely promoted by the People's Liberation Army in the 1940s as a form of collective entertainment. On the other, they recall the structure of photo albums or passports, each unfolding sequentially to reveal portraits across time, evoking both personal and collective histories.

In this 2007 iteration, the imagery centres on repeated photographic portraits that have been reproduced and reworked through processes of copying and layering. The faces appear in shifting tonal registers, moving between clarity and near abstraction, as though fading through memory. The repetition of a single visage across panels creates a rhythmic unfolding, reinforcing ideas of identity, transformation, and impermanence.

The dominant red operates as a potent visual signifier, referencing both imperial traditions and the ideological charge of the Cultural Revolution. At the same time, it compresses and unifies the image. Areas of blue and orange interrupt this field, introducing moments of visual and emotional tension.

Through repetition, fragmentation, and colour, Lee develops a meditation on cycles of life and death, where the individual image becomes entangled with broader historical and cultural narratives.

© Lindy Lee/Copyright Agency, 2026