Yee I-Lann

In 1994, Yee returned to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, finding work as a production assistant at a production house, soon becoming a production designer for feature films.[1] Yee also worked part-time as a paparazzo, shooting scenes of Kuala Lumpur's nightlife for ETC. Magazine.[6] At the Annexe Wing of the Central Market Building in Kuala Lumpur, Yee's long-term collaborator Nani Kahar set up the architecture firm, DNA Studio, becoming a play space that gave rise to labDNA, a collective consisting of Yee, Nani Kahar, and media design lecturer Colleen Macklin.[6] The collective explored the question of how a city that was constantly undergoing change could be used by the young.[6]

labDNA hosted a series of creative happenings with different collaborators across the city.[6] In 1996, they organised To Catch A Cloud at the National Planetarium of Malaysia, a multimedia theatre event telling the story of "a young boy whose dream is to catch a cloud of his own".[6] Following To Catch A Cloud, subsequent projects held between July and October 1997 saw the use of rave music as a means of transforming one's experience to space and other bodies.[6] For these projects, labDNA collaborated with architects to create immersive installations around which performance artworks could be staged.[6] The first was Suburbia Panics, held at a colonial bungalow turned restaurant The Kapitan's Club, followed by Urban Paranoia on the rooftop of a corporate building, Menara IMC.[6] The series culminated in Blue Skies, a party held at a former colonial prison, Pudu Prison, which was slated for demolishment.[6] Though more established figures in the English-speaking Malaysian art scene protested against what they perceived as the frivolous use of a space burdened with history, labDNA went ahead with the event, with Yee and Nani Kahar responding that while they were not qualified to address spirits, they were qualified to address urban youth.[6] After the conclusion of Blue Skies, the labDNA team, shaken by the controversy, decided to take a break.[6]

From 1998 to 2002, Yee focussed on production design in film productions, with few explorations in contemporary art, such as with her appearance at the 1999 Asia Pacific Triennial in Queensland, Australia.[6] Following this renewed connection with Australia, Yee developed her Horizon series in 2003 during a residency in Sydney.[6] Yee would exhibit the series at her first solo show at a commercial gallery in Kuala Lumpur, marking the start of her career as a professional artist.[6]

Between 2003 and 2008, Yee lectured at Akademi Seni Budaya dan Warisan Kebangsaan (ASWARA), establishing the production design department.[4] She would continue to exhibit internationally, such as at the Singapore Biennale in 2006 and the Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale in 2009.[5]

In a 2013 photocollage series titled Picturing Power, Yee mixed colonial-era and contemporary images to suggest a Malaysian present still dictated by an unresolved colonial history.[7] In 2013, she also served as a member of the curatorial team for the fourth Singapore Biennale, If The World Changed.[5]

Her 2016 exhibition, Like the Banana Tree at the Gate, took inspiration from two motifs iconic in Malaysia and throughout Southeast Asia: the ubiquitous banana tree; and the pontianak, a vengeful female spirit with long black hair who is sometimes said to reside in that plant.[5] Through a series of digital photocollage works and a three-channel video work, Yee evoked the potency of a feminine power derived from local knowledge and folkloric traditions.[5]

In 2017 she was featured in the major group exhibition, SUNSHOWER, Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia 1980s to Now, jointly hosted by the Mori Art Museum and National Art Center in Tokyo, Japan.[5]

Since 2018, Yee has been based Kota Kinabalu, collaborating with indigenous weavers across Sabah to make tikar (woven mats).[4] These collaborations are with the inland community, Sabahan Dusun and Murut weavers in the Keningau interior, and the sea community, Bajau Sama Dilaut weavers from Pulau Omadal, Semporna.[4][8] These craft communities in the mountains and plains of Borneo are usually bound to the tourist market, and such collaborations have led a sea village community on the border between the Sulu and Celebes Seas to turn from fishing to weaving, reducing pressure on the Coral Triangle.[4] In the context of these collaborations, the woven mat is seen as a local, egalitarian, democratic, and feminist platform; a shared experience of intimacy tied to everyday life and ritual.[4]