I grew up in various places – from China to Kenya, then Thailand, and am now living in the UK. From this experience came my growing desire to reclaim my original culture – Chinese culture – from subjects of immediate interest to me. For the past year I have been re-visiting specific Chinese objects of significance – from cloud-like stone pillars to artifactual bronze wine vessels from the ancient Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties. I feel an intense interest in these cultural relics themselves; their role defines my relationship with the audience in a “contemporary” and “displaced” context, and allows me to explore personal concerns relating to displacement, transexperience and diaspora.

More recently, I have struggled, but am slowly achieving an abstraction of the vessel motif in my paintings, as can be observed in Mass and subsequent works. This reduction of motif is a direct reflection of my declining exclusive obsession with these objects, the rising debate of the importance of these objects to me and my works, and growing confidence in what my paintings can achieve. By exploiting my familiarity with these objects’ structure, my paintings have now reduced to abbreviations of marks, in order to achieve the essential qualities I work for in a painting – “the powerful” and “the bizarre”, and a visually striking image. This progression has open up the scope for me into questioning issues in relation to authenticity, authority, and the significance of culturally-specific motifs in artworks. Furthermore, it has also allowed me to intensely engage in painting and the painterly process. … Read More