Shiseido Gallery will host Malaysian artist Simryn Gill's first solo show in Tokyo. Gill, who currently resides in Sydney, has exhibited at international exhibitions such as "TransCulture" (official supporting program at the 46th Venice Biennale, Venice; Naoshima Contemporary Art, 1995), the traveling exhibition "Cities on the Move" (1997), Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art (2001) and The Biennale of Sydney (2002). Her works have attracted audiences in various cities such as Sydney, Kuala Lumpur, London and Helsinki.
With her previous works, Gill has employed objects that she found on the streets as well as those she obtained by carefully combing the beaches. This act of collecting has been central to her practice - she calls the outcome "object works " - along with photographs, which she has been increasingly producing in recent years. "Power Station," which will make its first appearance at Shiseido Gallery, will be a combination of objects and photographs.

With "Power Station," Gill has photographed two different but neighboring buildings in her hometown Port Dickson in Malaysia; an old power plant and an old residence where she spent her childhood days. These two constructions, though decidedly different in terms of appearance, scale and function, are situated in surprising proximity to each other even to this day. Gill's photographs capture the interiors of the power plant in color and the house in monochrome, which are placed in pairs across two adjacent walls, in accordance with either visual or functional similarity (for example, the water purification chamber against the kitchen, and the turbine room against the bedroom). The symmetrical construct of the display enables viewers to compare the buildings that have quietly observed and contained time in their respective ways.
For nearly forty years, the power plant and house have maintained a relationship of curious coexistence. Together they face the same beach, where Gill frequents to collect things that have been washed up onshore. The collection amassed over the years include natural materials such as wood pieces, shells and animal bones, as well as man-made products such as plastic, glass and metal parts. Tossed about in rolling waves and sand, these objects have softened both in form and color. And thus, no longer do they appear like individual objects of varying provenance, but rather as equal elements within this landscape. The objects, which have accumulated time in themselves like the two buildings, will be displayed on the gallery floor.