pip & pop's psychadelic candy mountains are dripping with selfish desire

australian artist tanya schultz (aka, pip & pop) has cast lands of magic and sugar and glitter and toys all over the world. but through february 17 — in downtown los angeles — corey helford gallery (CHG) will hoard all of the fun: presenting pip & pop’s U.S. debut, ‘here comes sunshine.’

all images by bryan ‘birdman’ mier

tastefully complimenting a new body of work by japanese-artist hikari shimoda, gallery 1 will be peppered with flicks of ‘kawaii’ spirit, sprinkled atop mushroom-trees, candy-mountains, sugar-tulips, and other inventions of an angsty-la-la-imagination. these playful yet meticulously crafted islands of sweets speak to ideas of dreamy nostalgia, youth, and material abundance. if you listen closely, you can almost hear the never-ending-loops, the happy-eerie giggles, the laughter-chant-songs of the rainbow gang — the spirits that inhabit this little universe. 

pip & pop, here, has combined hundreds of pounds of colored sugar, artificial flora, craft materials and found objects. the result isn’t a utopia, as much as it is the surface-level-representations of one. it’s a place of illusion, wish-fulfillment, and of course, folk stories — folk stories being whimsical mythologies of (mis)fortune and forewarning. specifically, ‘here comes sunshine’ references two mythologies: luilekkerland and the land of cockaigne. both are lands of plenty. both are made entirely of food. both are places of eternal satisfaction, where your desires are always — and at the same time, never — fulfilled.

schultz’s world is also made up of real places: the tiny clay cakes of japan, small ceramic fruits of mexico, the rainbow strings of korea, little netherland mushrooms, and of course, sunny, sunny LA: where a select few may sing and lick candy off of the sunny, sunny hills, until they’ve had their sunny, sunny fill.

26 colorful characters — the rainbow gang — will be on display for purchase. according to schultz, ‘the rainbow gang are the creatures that might inhabit the psychedelic world I’m creating for this exhibition. I see this work as multiple worlds within worlds, and I think they could be guardians of different places within this imagined landscape. I’m fascinated with folk tales of spirits inhabiting objects, or rocks and mountains that come to life. 

‘the rainbow gang is composed of creatures that are part sweet oozy cake, part sparkly magic rock,’ schultz continues. ‘rainbows are strongly connected to folklore about finding or searching for other worlds, and magical phenomenon. I want the work to evoke a momentary sense of optimism…but it is also an opportunity to contemplate excess and overabundance.’