Love Letter to Kidneys
Love Letter to Kidneys, 2024, oil on aluminum, 60 x 120 inches
The kidneys carry our past, present, and future. The kidneys are constantly in the present; the gifts of our conception; the burner that fires all of our organs. Filtering blood to find balance in the body, they embody both yang (fire) and yin (water) essences. These essences, inherited from our ancestors, determine our unique constitutions. Similarly, blood production and menstrual cycles are regulated by communication between heart fire and kidney water, with blood representing yang transformations of yin materials. This ebb and flow of masculine and feminine energies in the kidneys, blood creation, and menstrual cycles hold the past, present, and future simultaneously. In this piece, I embody both yang/fire/past and yin/water/future aspects of the kidneys on the left and right. In the center, the kidney meridian (energy channel) centers me in the present. Acupressure points, KI-27 and KI-12 are highlighted. KI-27, located on ones collar bones, can be tapped to open the chest and help with fear and fear based anxiety. KI-12, located on the lower pelvis, tonifies the Kidneys, strengthens the Uterus, and consolidate the Penetrating and Directing Vessels. Ten spots represent ten cycles of interrupted bleeding I am continuously reflecting on.
Artist Statement: Isabel Lu, MPH, RD, (she/they) is a Chinese American visual artist and health equity researcher born and raised in North Carolina. Isabel studied Western nutritional science as an undergraduate student at Cornell University and then public health and dietetics as a graduate student at UNC Chapel Hill. They were one of the 2023 Emerging Artists-in-Residence at Artspace, where they are now a studio artist. Utilizing varied methods of research–literary, ethnographic, community engaged, self-reflective–to inform their practice, Isabel’s work documents ridiculous and consequential moments of exploration, focusing on the self and concepts of wellbeing. Recognizing the separation of physical, emotional, and communal health in Western medicine–and lacking avenues for peace and healing where they grew up–Isabel found themself seeking spaces to explore holistic wellbeing. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) frameworks–developed over millennium–act as a guide to understand our contemporary existence. TCM illuminates the universes pendulum of opposing yet complementary forces (hot and cold, joy and grief, movement and stagnation, masculinity and femininity) which we must nourish in balance. In Isabel’s work, they adapt and redefine TCM knowledge to look at the body, queerness, and their surroundings. They use food, meridians, and zodiacs as silly yet meaningful symbols of ownership and identity. Isabel paints vivid and muted colors that define and redefine ourselves; their brushwork is translucent and layered to convey the complexity and vulnerability of identities and experiences.
