Eye-con Both directly and indirectly, the media have a profound effect on our lives as they shape and manuipulate us, creating a false sense of reality. My work explores the ideals of beauty the media has imposed on women. As an Asian Canadian woman, living in the U.S., I am reexamining the intersection of mainstream culture and minority experience from a marginal perspective and the impact it will have on my daughter as a biracial person in America. In an age when more women gain freedom and financial power, we are overwhelmed with notions of beauty and aging, and cosmetic surgery is the fastest growing medical specialty. Because of the influx of ideas and images from western culture, largely through western media, many Asian women are transforming their looks by undergoing surgical alteration of their eyelids to give them a more western look. In my work, I have performed digital eye surgery on the icons of western beauty to superimpose my own eyes on their faces creating a hybrid -- an Eye-con. Thus, the Eye-con series explores the evolving notions of beauty as women reconstruct their own bodies and perhaps identities while examining the effect of this evolution on American culture.   -Sasha Yungju Lee   Sasha Yungju Lee was born and raised in Seoul, South Korea and moved to Toronto, Canada in 1971. She graduated from Ontario College of Art in Toronto in 1984. Her work uses imagery in the popular mass media to question the roles and identities of women and Asian-Americans. She has worked professionally within the film and television industry as art director and designer for the past 10 years. Articles about Sasha Yungju Lee and her work have appeared in numerous publications, including Los Angeles Times, Kyoto Journal, Artweek, Now Magazine, Korean Times and Profile. Sasha's work has been exhibited in numerous group exhibitions within the United States and Canada. The artist lives and works in San Francisco, CA.