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Video: Trey Burns, Dallas Museum of Art
All works by Matthew Wong © 2022 Matthew Wong Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Hover over a year to learn more
2015
October 2, 2019 Wong dies in Edmonton, Canada. He was thirty-five years old.
Wong has his solo show Day by Night at Massimo De Carlo in Hong Kong and posthumous second New York solo show, Blue, at Karma.
Wong travels to the United States and settles in Edmonton, Canada. He participates in the group exhibition Outside at Karma’s temporary gallery in Amagansett, Long Island, New York.
CLOSER LOOKING
2017
2016
2018
OCTOBER 2, 2019
2013
Matthew Wong secures his first studio space in Zhongshan, Guangdong Province, China, painting in Zhongshan and his home in Hong Kong.
2014
Wong has his first solo show, Matthew Wong: Chapter One, at the Cuiheng Art Museum in Zhongshan.
Wong has second solo show Pulse of the Land at the Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre featuring his new landscape paintings.
Dallas Museum of Art acquires Matthew Wong’s painting The West, 2017.
Wong gains critical attention with his first U.S. solo show, Matthew Wong, at Karma in New York.
2019
CAREER HIGHLIGHTS
OCTOBER 16, 2022 - FEBRUARY 19, 2023
Wong has his second solo show, Pulse of the Land, at the Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre featuring his new landscape paintings.
Wong attracts critical attention with his first U.S. solo show, Matthew Wong, at Karma in New York.
Matthew Wong, The Realm of Appearances, 2018
Self-taught and operating outside the so-called centers of the art world, Wong had an intuitive ability to connect himself with other artists and creatives. This reflects in his diverse range of styles, which readily recall Post-Impressionists, Fauvists, 17th–century Qing period ink painters, and contemporaries he admired. Wong synthesized many artists and mediums to create a visual language uniquely his own.
The sense of non-specificity and universality of place characteristic of his intimate landscapes reflects his own expansive worldview and transnational, bicultural life: born in Toronto in 1984 and growing up in Hong Kong and Toronto; attending college in the U.S. at the University of Michigan; and studying in Hong Kong and working in China before returning to Canada in 2016, where he settled in Edmonton.
Known for his evocative, unpeopled landscape paintings in an incredibly wide range of styles, Matthew Wong achieved resounding critical acclaim in his short, more than six-year artistic career. Over his artistic journey—from 2013 until his death in 2019 at the age of 35—Wong left a remarkable oeuvre of over 1,000 paintings in ink, gouache, oil, and acrylic. The retrospective The Realm of Appearances surveys his brief yet intense development.
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In 2017, the DMA became the first museum to acquire a work by the then unknown young artist Matthew Wong. Over the next two years, his solo debut show in New York received critical recognition and Wong’s artistry rapidly attained new heights. The DMA is honored to be ongoing participants in Wong’s story by organizing his first U.S. museum exhibition and centering attention back on his art and his unprecedented artistic journey. I am excited that we can present the astounding beauty Wong left in this world so that it can continue to connect and inspire a wider public.
Vivian Li The Lupe Murchison Curator of Contemporary Art
THROUGH THE LENS: THE CURATOR
THROUGH THE LENS: MATTHEW WONG
Painting is a mysterious, often frustrating, but ultimately compulsive activity for me; working on a daily basis is basically a way for me to keep track of my life, like a diary. Because I have never had any formal training in painting or drawing, the way I go about it is probably not a 'correct' way - instead it is very intuitive and impulsive and I never set out on a blank canvas or paper with any notion of what I am going to do…I'm still working to come into my own, so I cannot say with any assurance what the meaning or significance of my body of work is yet, but at the moment what sustains me is an enthusiasm and faith in the fact that even though I never know where I'm going with a painting, I will eventually get there. The surprise of finding out is what keeps me going from painting to painting. -From Artist’s Statement, Matthew Wong, 2013
Matthew Wong, 2015. Portrait of the artist. Courtesy Matthew Wong Foundation.
THROUGH THE LENS: CRITICS ON WONG
Jerry Saltz Vulture
Eric Sutphin Art In America
Roberta Smith New York Times
John Yau Hyperallergic
PURCHASE CATALOGUE
This exhibition is accompanied by a catalogue distributed by Yale University Press, with contributions by Vivian Li, Matthew Higgs, Laura Hartman, Lesley Ma, Hilde Nelson, and Veronica Myers. The catalogue is for sale in the DMA Store for $35.
Visit the DMA Store or order online:
EXHIBITION CATALOGUE
Matthew Wong synthesized many artists and materials across spans of time, place, and mediums to create a visual language uniquely his own. Painting was just one form of expression that fascinated Wong. A poet, photographer, and author before becoming a painter, he regularly attended poetry clubs and contributed to art and literary journals in Hong Kong. He was also known for his passion for film and hip-hop music. Although seemingly unrelated to contemporary art or landscape painting, as Wong remarked, reading a poem might provide visual inspiration, or listening to a song by Drake could invoke a personal memory with universal resonance. Through his paintings, Wong hoped he could similarly generate feelings of human connection.
INSPiration: the cultural draw
Andrei Tarkovsky: Mirror (1975)
FILM
VISUAL INSPO
Paul Thomas Anderson: There Will Be Blood (2007)
Martin Scorsese: The Last Temptation of Christ (1988)
Akira Kurosawa: Yojimbo (1961)
David Lynch: Mulholland Drive (2001)
Sergio Leone: Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
Stanley Kubrick: 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Chris Marker: La Jetée (1962)
POETRY
excerpt from Four People, – Matthew Wong
Need little intro blurb from Vivian here for context
Yesterday, – Matthew Wong
Matthew Wong, So Much Depends..., 2017, Oil on canvas
Wong painted this image, taking as its title the first line of the following poem: The Red Wheelbarrow (1923) by William Carlos Williams so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens
Listen to some of Matthew Wong's favorite music to paint to on our Spotify playlist ›
MUSIC
*Warning: some songs may contain explicit language; the songs are uncensored and reflect how Matthew Wong listened to them while deriving inspiration as he worked.
Enjoy these program events at the DMA related to the exhibition Matthew Wong: The Realm of Appearances.
The Matthew Wong Foundation and the DMA’s community health partners continue to advocate for mental health awareness. Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care, UT Southwestern Medical Center www.utsouthwestern.edu/education/medical-school/departments/psychiatry/research/center/ Grant Halliburton https://www.granthalliburton.org/ Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute https://mmhpi.org/
Mental Health Resources and Partners
MORE RESOURCES
Temple Grandin Friday, October 14, 7:30 p.m.
Make & Take: Intuitive Creation, Poetry and Pictures Friday, November 18, 5:00–8:30 p.m.
Arts & Letters Live
Friday Focus on Matthew Wong
Wednesday, February 8, 7:00 p.m.
Join Dr. Russell Toll, Assistant Professor with the Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care at UT Southwestern and Executive Director of the nonprofit Compassion Neuroscience, for an exploration of the science within art and the art within science through the works of Matthew Wong.
Lecture
Panel Discussion
Get in touch with your intuition in this program that unites visual and literary expression with a tour, film screening, and DJ.
MORE INFO ›
CHECK BACK FOR MORE INFO SOON ›
Matthew Wong: His Art and Legacy Thursday, October 13, 6:00 p.m.
Visual Thinking: The Hidden Gifts of People Who Think in Pictures, Patterns, and Abstractions
Join Dr. Vivian Li, the DMA’s Lupe Murchison Curator of Contemporary Art, and guests for a panel conversation on the DMA’s newest exhibition, Matthew Wong: The Realm of Appearances.
Talk with Dr. Russell Toll
