Wong Keen

The Flesh series was first shown in 2015 as part of a fund-raising exhibition at The Substation; the most expensive painting at the exhibition, which sold for $40,000, was a painting from the Flesh series. The series was then shown at Flesh on Loop: Wong Keen's Solo Exhibition in 2018 before the large-scale exhibition Wong Keen: Flesh Matters in 2018 at Helutrans Art Space. The exhibition was co-organised by artcommune gallery and The Culture Story, and featured the mural-sized 305 x 610 cm painting The Aftermath (2017). Wong Keen: Flesh Matters presented 50 works of art, including an installation, and worked as a formal and comprehensive introduction of Wong's Flesh series.

The Second Nature paintings were largely produced from 2013-2014. Second Nature featured a rudimentary printmaking technique where "the artist first executes an acrylic composition on a laminated board; a sheet of rice paper is then pressed over the board, with the composition rubbed through to create the first layer on the rice paper. This process is repeated another few times until the artist is satisfied with the layers of pictorial effects. The final composition is then painted directly onto the rice paper, leveraging the existing formation of colours and textures." The series was also informed by Wong's collage practice, which complicates the dimensional qualities of the image.

The origins of the Flesh series can be traced a series of oil on canvas works that were executed in Beijing, 2012, during an artist residency Wong had undertaken at the Galerie Urs Meile. This series was later fully elaborated from 2015-2018, when Wong transferred his initial exploration of Flesh into a sustained series that were mostly acrylic paint on canvas or paper and collages. The pictorial vocabulary of Flesh would come to include the carcass, the meat shop, burgers, and nudes. The process through which Flesh came to be incorporated within the artist's practice was, as described by Wong:

Nudes, especially with monumental landscape-like compositions, continued to be a part of Wong's practice, all the way to the 2010s; the separation of these later nudes from the landscape/nudes of 1996-7 is unclear. Wong would also gradually move into the use of acrylic paint as his main canvas medium, rather than oil. As a commentary of an acrylic nude painting of 2007 elaborates:

Wong produced two series of paintings on rice paper—Second Nature and Orbits of Colour—in the 2010s. These paintings continued Wong's innovative ink-like use of acrylic pigments on rice paper, and can be considered an elaboration of the Formation series. Both Second Nature and Orbits of Colour series were first shown in solo exhibitions held at artcommune gallery, in 2014 and 2016 respectively.

Picture Writing, executed largely between 2009 and 2012, elaborated on Wong's study into calligraphic expressions and "may be viewed as an extension to his earlier series on the calligraphic female nude [the 'Susie' nudes]". It consists mainly of acrylic paint on paper works, though Wong also executed some nudes with oil on canvas and painted ceramics.

The 1996 exhibition garnered much media attention and worked well to reintroduce Wong to the Singaporean art world that developed in his absence. Relationships built with individuals such as Tommy Koh and Koh Seow Chuan resulted in the landmark retrospective Wong Keen: A Singapore Abstract Expressionist, held in the Singapore Art Museum from 9–29 March 2007. The exhibition was preceded by Koh Seow Chuan's large donation of 63 paintings by Wong Keen to the Singapore Art Museum. These works ranged "from those he painted in the United States in the 1960s to more recent ones that were done in Singapore".

In the same year, Wong's painterly origin was given a further spotlight when he was shown at the National Art Museum of China, Beijing, together with his mentor Chen Wen Hsi and friend Goh Beng Kwan, exhibiting 15 artworks each from the National Collection. The exhibition was titled Encounters and Journeys: Singapore Artists (simplified Chinese: 游·遇·艺：新加坡艺术家; traditional Chinese: 遊·遇·藝：新加坡藝術家; pinyin: Yóu·Yù·Yì: Xīnjīapō yìshùjiā) and ran from 12-21 Oct 2007. The exhibition was part of Singapore Season 2007, an exercise in cultural diplomacy.

Expressions by Wong Keen. Galerie Belvédère (2007).

Wong's pioneering presence in New York was also notable for the role it played in Singaporean art history. The first notable artist of his generation to reside, practice, and study in the complex New York art world, Wong paved the way for later artists such as Goh Beng Kwan, Choey Kwoy Kay, and Chow Yin Tian to train in New York, personally guiding them through their application processes and shared his 2000 sq ft lodgings on Broadway with them; Goh would be the next notable artist to be accepted at the Art Students League, in 1962. He was also one of very few artists of Chinese origin based in New York at that time.

Both Wong sr. and Chu practiced Chinese calligraphy, and can be classified among the literati calligraphers of early Singapore. These calligraphers inherited the aesthetic sense of amateurism (as opposed to the professionalism of court painters) of dynastic Chinese scholar-officials, favouring spontaneity and an affinity for literature and belle lettres. Chu was especially serious in this pursuit, participating in many group exhibitions and even holding her own solo exhibition in 1997. This familial setting would have an enduring influence on Wong; his early New York days would be marked by explorations into calligraphic aesthetics, and he would produce collages that fragmented and reassembled his mother's calligraphy throughout his career.

Lotus Figures: Recent Works by Wong Keen. Shenn's Fine Art (1997).

Wong decided to close down Keen Gallery and formally base part of his practice in Singapore in 1996.

Wong became acquainted with gallerist Gim Ng of Shenn's Fine Art in the 1990s. This relationship culminated in Wong's first large-scale exhibition in Singapore since he left in 1961, titled After Thirty-Five Years in New York (1961-1996). The exhibition was held at Takashimaya Gallery, Singapore, from 3–11 August 1996. Wong described the experience as "a kid coming back with his report card after 35 years". The exhibition featured "more than 50 of his works spanning four decades, from the '60s to the '90s". Being his first retrospective exhibition, Wong took the chance to take stock of his career in a newspaper interview:

Since returning to Singapore in 1996, Wong has been represented by a series of art galleries in Singapore (including Shenn's Fine Art, Galerie Belvedere, and artcommune gallery) as well as taking up residencies and holding exhibitions in Asia. Able to spend much more time and energy on painting, Wong's practice saw a period of intense productivity, resulting in the renewal and consolidation of his aesthetic thoughts into several distinct series of paintings. Wong's practice did not entail of periods that succeeded each other, resulting in many overlapping series and outlying works.

The post-1996 series of landscapes were first shown at Caldwell House Gallery, CHIJMES in August 1997, organised by Shenn's Fine Art. This initial set of works from this series was largely completed from 1996-1997 as Wong moved back to Singapore and travelled through Thailand, Bali, Java, and China, incorporating the new images of Asia he garnered into his paintings. A distinct but related series of Vietnam paintings were inspired by Wong's visit to Huế in 1987, and was exhibited in Gallery Vinh Loi, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and The American Club, Singapore in 1998. The Vietnam paintings are distinguished by a relatively strong sense of realism and figurative elements.

Wong Keen: After Thirty-Five Years in New York. Shenn's Fine Art (1996).

In 1995, Wong planned to hold an exhibition of Singaporean artists in Keen Gallery to increase the Singaporean presence in the New York art world. He found that "working there [New York] as part of a small group of Singaporean painters can be quite lonely sometimes". The planned exhibitors were Chng Seok Tin, Choy Weng Yang, Goh Beng Kwan, Goh Ee Choo, and Yeo Kim Seng. Though the exhibition was reported in the newspapers, it did not materialise due to a lack of funds.

The Caesura series manipulated his mother Chu Hen-Ai's calligraphy and his own take on calligraphic strokes through the combined use of ink, paper collages, and acrylic paint, applied on rice paper. Wong's use of acrylic paint was unusual in how it referenced the fluidity of ink in Chinese paintings. This series formed perhaps Wong's clearest repudiation and redefinition of the traditional inspirations and cultural moulds that shaped his practice, as Kwok and Ong have written: "Caesura works on the theme of destruction and rebirth. These works combine scraps of traditional Chinese prints and calligraphy on paper, juxtaposed with ink washes and acrylic shapes. In this manner, traditional Chinese art is fragmented and remade into new forms." In a 1994 interview about his Caesura series, Wong Keen explained:

Perhaps the most important exhibition put up by Keen Gallery was Red Star Over China: Tenuous Peace, held from 5 May - 5 June 1993. The group show featured artworks by artists Liu Xiaodong, Cha Li, Chen Xiaohong, Hao Zhiqiang, Hou Wenyi, Lin Lin, Ma Kelu, Ni Jun, Xia Baoyuan, Yu Hong, Zhang Zeping, Zhao Bandi, and Zheng Dasheng. The artists were largely young Chinese contemporary artists, some of whom were the first generation to base themselves overseas after the Cultural Revolution. The exhibition was one of the earlier showings of Chinese contemporary art in the United States.

From 1990, Wong started to spend more time in Singapore to tend to his mother's ailing health. Although most of his practice was still based in the United States, where he continued to hold exhibitions, he began to reconnect with the Singaporean art world and his old friends. As recounted by Wong: "I had been trying to come back (to exhibit) for years... I still have a fascination with Singapore. I come back to visit whenever I have the chance."

The Torso series began as a new approach to the nude, manipulated through simpler geometric planes and solid colour blocks. These nudes were often disembodied, focussing on the points in which their torso meets their legs. These nudes were "[depicted] in the two-dimensional as opposed to the conventional method of three-dimensional realism, thereby introducing a sense of flatness to his work." Antecedences to the Torso series were first exhibited at Gallery Triform, Taiwan, where 20 "recent works, mostly abstracted forms inspired by female nudes" were shown. A review of the exhibition remarked that "Wong Keen's recent works were mostly based on the human form; with twisted brushstrokes he retained his usual abstract style." The Torso series resulted as an elaboration of this earlier series of nudes exhibited in Taiwan, executed mainly between 1986-1996, with the important introduction of paper collage techniques (reminiscent of paper collé) that further flattened parts of the nude composition.

In his time operating Keen Gallery, Wong formed a friendship with the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, the Taiwanese-American artist C. J. Yao, and the Chinese violinist Xu Weiling. They would meet almost every week in the 1980s.

Wong's art practice was disrupted by the business of Keen Gallery and he would not be able to dedicate himself to painting fully until the late-1980s. He was reported in 1971 as hoping to send recent paintings to Singapore for Chen Wen Hsi to organise into an exhibition, but that did not materialise. Though his output was limited in this period, it was still marked by a developed interaction with form within his paintings, particularly as he settled on his preferred subject matter and worked to stylise them. Commenting on a work of this time, Kwok Kian Chow and Ong Zhen Min wrote:

Wong returned to the exhibition circuit in the late 1980s after personal and professional commitments realigned, allowing him more time to dedicate to his practice. Wong first participated in the 1987 group exhibition The Commemoration of the Nanking Massacre, sponsored by the Chinese Alliance in New York. Soon after, his contacts with Taiwanese artists established through Keen Gallery resulted in two solo exhibitions in 1988 and 1989, at El Museo de Arte Costarricense, Costa Rica, and Gallery Triform (simplified Chinese: 三原色艺术中心; traditional Chinese: 三原色藝術中心; pinyin: Sānyuánsè yìshù zhōngxīn), Taiwan, respectively. This was 21 years since his last solo show. Thereafter, Wong participated in a series of group shows in New York until his started to base part of his practice back in Singapore. Two of Wong's works were collected by the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, New York, after a group exhibition there in 1994. Wong held his 10th-12th solo exhibitions between 1994-1995, at the William Whipple Gallery (Southwest State University), Gilwood Haven Art Gallery, and Carnegie Art Centre respectively, all in the state of Minnesota.

Keen Gallery moved to 423 Broome Street in 1971, expanding to include a gallery business. Though mainly staging curated exhibitions of other artists, Wong also sold some of his own paintings through Keen Gallery. Artists represented or exhibited by Keen Gallery included Patrick O'Brien, Serge Lemoyne, Lee Shi-Chi, Jenny Chen, Ming Fay, Camilo Kerrigan, Edward Evans, Tino Zago, Dennis Hwang, Michiko Edamitsu, George Bethea, and Norman Barish. Keen Gallery also hosted a reading of poems by Pang-cheng Peng and the play Prism View by Joe Fox.

After his two solo exhibitions in 1967, Wong found a job as Art Director at the Police Athlete League, New York. He worked in the job until 1969, setting up Keen Framing Gallery in 1969. This allowed him to continue working on his own practice while keeping in touch with the wider art world. His framing services were popular, garnering clients such as the Museum of Modern Art, Time Magazine, the Rockefeller Foundation, and Macy's. He was known for his artisan framing services, providing framing design with artistic sensibilities.

The works produced in Europe garnered interest in the Western art world, resulting in three solo exhibitions: St. Martin's School of Art (1966, at the request of Principal Edward J. Morss), Sarah Lawrence College, New York (1967), and The Art Students League, New York (1967). Although he also showed oil paintings, Western media seemed more interested in his ink paintings:

Wong Keen returned to New York in 1966 and graduated in the same year.

His next solo exhibition was held from 27 Feb-18 Mar 1965, at Westerly Gallery shortly after he was awarded the Ford Foundation tuition scholarship. As accounted by gallery manager Suzanne Varady, "when I first saw his work early this winter I was so impressed I immediately set about arranging an exhibition." The works in this exhibition seemed to have made an impact in the way Wong's practice stood between Chinese aesthetic influences and Western modernism. Sidney Gross commented that "Wong was one of a group of talented painters here [New York] trying to assimilate many Western ideas without losing their own identity." The Taiwanese artist and writer Ho Tiehhua (simplified Chinese: 何铁华; traditional Chinese: 何鐵華; pinyin: Hé Tiě Huá), then based in New York, wrote a lengthy commentary:

Wong Keen soon won the Art Students League's Edward G. McDowell Traveling Scholarship for 1965, the first painter of Chinese origin to do so. The scholarship required Wong to undertake a part of his studies in Paris and other European countries, and carried the stipend of $3,000 per annum.

Wong returned to Singapore on 28 June 1965 to spend time with his parents before embarking on his European tour. In his stay, he executed a series of ink paintings that elaborated on the abstract ink expressions he developed in New York, but with a greater emphasis on the white space compositional device of Bada Shanren. These paintings bore the inscriptions of one or both of his parents (such as in Run in the Family II, 1965) and signified towards the later Caesura series of collages that bore similar familial themes.

Chen Wen Hsi's presence at the start of Wong's European trip may have further honed in Wong's attention to the art of Bada Shanren; besides being influenced by Bada Shanren, Chen was a renowned collector of Chinese art that included a celebrated album of Bada Shanren. Lotuses would enter Wong's oeuvre in this period, producing semi-abstract ink paintings such as Lotus (1965), providing Wong a vehicle through which he may more intuitively explore the relationship between Chinese ink painting and Western modernism. Commenting on this series, Ma Peiyi wrote:

His new ideas about the function of colour was coupled with a personal take on gestural brushstrokes, especially in relation to action painting. Through the ideas of Franz Kline and Robert Motherwell, action painting drew inspiration from the expressive potential of East Asian calligraphy. Wong brought into gestural strokes the idea of colour tonality, derived also from East Asian calligraphy and his training in the Chinese ink medium. For Wong, calligraphy is also more than an art form and carried familial connotations, inspired from his parents' practice. As such, Chinese characters often appear in his paintings (such as in Untitled, 1964), facilitating the autobiographical element that has been detected in his paintings, allowing him to stake his own position in the internationalist modern art world.

Wong's second solo exhibition was held at New York's Bridge Gallery from 9–27 April 1963, perhaps the first solo exhibition a Singaporean staged in New York. The Nanyang Siang Pau reports that "Wong Keen exhibits 25 large-scale oil paintings, the largest of which were 8 x 6 feet, the smallest of which was 4 x 3 feet, and 30 ink paintings, all completed in America." An appraisal by his lecturer Sidney Gross was published and translated in both American and Singaporean newspapers:

One of Wong's most important series of works—the nude—started to become part of Wong's practice around 1962. Commenting on a representative work of the period, Arms Stretching (1963), Ma Peiyi observes through the circular structuring of Wong's nude forms his attempt in engaging more stylistically with the shape of his subjects "without compromising on [their] basic anatomical proportions." Wong's friend and fellow artist Choy Weng Yang wrote of the same painting:

A protégé of the pioneer artist Chen Wen Hsi while also training under Liu Kang, Wong counts among the second generation of Singaporean artists. His early works bore distinctive features of the Nanyang School, with an emphasis on cubist and fauvist modernist ideas. After enrolling in the Art Students League of New York in 1961, his practice has broadened to include influences from abstract expressionism, colour field painting, and action painting, all the while maintaining an affinity with Chinese calligraphic aesthetics and the idiosyncratic compositional forms of Bada Shanren.

In 1961, following the acceptance of his application to the Art Students League of New York, Wong Keen held his first solo exhibition to fundraise for his studies. This exhibition, held at the National Library from July 1–5 (with an extended day), made 19-year-old Wong the youngest Malayan artist to hold a solo show. The exhibition was co-organised by the Singapore Art Society, the Society of Chinese Artists, and the Chinese High School Old Boys' Association.

The Art Students League, which Wong Keen enrolled in from 1961-1966, played a significant part in educating a new generation of artists working with recourse to abstract expressionism. Wong enrolled in the Life Drawing, Painting and Composition course instructed by faculty members Morris Kantor, Vaclav Vytlacil, and Sidney Gross over the period 1961-1965. The course required Wong to dedicate 3.5 hours a day, 5 days a week. Wong earlier years in New York were marked by a degree of poverty, requiring him to take up part-time jobs on top of selling his paintings. Following the award of the League's Ford Foundation tuition scholarship in 1964, which covered the cost of one course of his choice, he was able to concentrate more on his practice.

In his ink paintings, Wong sought out a midway between two traditions, much as commentators have often recognised in the newspapers. Bringing the gesturalism of action painting and modernist compositional sensibilities into the realm of calligraphic strokes, Wong's early New York ink paintings thus reflected "an urgent need to re-evaluate 'the sublime nature of abstraction that long defined the Chinese ink culture.'" Roy Moyer commented that "when he arrived in New York in 1961 to study at the Art Students League, he was quite comfortable with abstract expressionist art, since there is nothing more abstract than those Chinese calligraphic ideograms which he knew so well."

His first major commission came in 1960, to paint a mural for the Lido Cinema on Orchard Road, operated by the Shaw Brothers. Due to Wong's departure from Singapore the next year, this commission was not fulfilled.

New York of the early 1960s was where abstract expressionism had matured and been well-established; Stella Paul describes a "first generation" of abstract expressionists from 1943-mid 1950s that "effectively shifted the art world’s focus from Europe (specifically Paris) to New York in the postwar years". This departure from Parisian modernism (which heavily influenced the Nanyang School) was a major factor in Wong Keen's shift away from his previous practice.

Wong's early practice was influenced by the Nanyang School, as refracted through Chen. Specifically, Wong inherited Chen's emphasis on cubist and fauvist ideas. This aesthetic direction is especially obvious in the oil painting Bicycle (1959), "demonstrating the teenager's interest in the cubist fragmentation of a flat pictorial plane and stark angular forms". Wong's early Chinese ink paintings were also affected by Chen's practice. Lotus (1956) exhibits tonal wash qualities valued by Chen, through his study of Bada Shanren, but with modernist compositional sensibilities. Perhaps more evident in his oil paintings, Wong's subject matter also conformed to the ideals of the Nanyang School—to depict the lived reality of Southeast Asia.

Impressed by her son's sketches of figures in magazines, Chu arranged for Wong to take drawing lessons from family friend Liu Kang. Wong was then aged around 10-11. Wong soon went on to take more technical lessons with Chen Wen Hsi, focusing on oils and Chinese ink. Wong's relationship with Chen would become especially close and shaped Wong's early career. In 1957, Chen moved out of the Chinese High School Teachers' Quarters into his home and studio at 5 Kingsmead Road, where he hosted close students and conducted more in-depth art lessons. Between 1957 and 1961, Wong was a regular visitor to 5 Kingsmead Road, together with a group of friends that included Goh Beng Kwan. Wong worked on the in-situ mural Chen designed for his residence.

Wong's prodigious talent began to draw attention as he started to participate and exhibit in Singapore's broader art world. In 1956, he won the first prize in the 'C' Category of the Shell Art Competition. From 1957-1960, Wong was selected to show his works at each of the Singapore Art Society's Annual Open Exhibition; the invitation in 1957 made him the youngest artist (at the age of 15) to have shown in this series of exhibitions. These exhibitions were juried by the leading Singaporean artists such as Ho Kok Hoe, Georgette Chen, and Cheong Soo Pieng, and were one of the main venues through which aspiring artists established themselves.

Wong enrolled in the Chinese High School from 1955-56.

Wong Keen (Chinese: 王瑾; pinyin: Wáng Jǐn, born 23 November 1942) is a Singaporean painter who was primarily trained in New York. He is known for being one of the first Singaporean artists to be educated in the United States and for his syncretic body of work that melds together the sensibilities of Chinese literati painting and the New York School. His practice, unusual for his generation, has led to him being described as "Singapore's first abstract expressionist". From 1969 to 1996, Wong also founded and operated Keen Gallery in New York, a framing studio and exhibition space.