Reminiscences | Exhibition Introduction

Exploring the relationship between people and the city is the central theme of Joshua Leung and Kwong Kwok Wai's work. Both are contemporary artists born and raised in Hong Kong, a unique place in terms of geography, culture and academic background, Leung and Kwong's work conveys a dense expression of urban conditions and their own feelings about living in the city.

Joshua believes that art is a powerful tool for communicating values and perspectives - a glue that binds communities together. His works are not only narratives rooted in reality but also, retain a sense of selfconscious spirituality that is intertwined with the abstraction of the subject matter.

For Kwok Wai finding 'Elysium' is a universal desire, he expressed it in a contemporary approach using abstractions to push the boundaries of interpretation. Using old local maps as a reference in his painting process, he transformed them into organic marks and shapes of a new imaginary land. For him, it’s a process of rebirth and reconciliation with the unknown self.

Both artists record their feelings about Hong Kong, hoping to build a bridge through their works, thus communicating with the viewer and creating resonance.

Exhibition Details

• Reminiscences｜Joshua Leung x Kwong Kwok Wai Exhibition
• Date: 12 Aug - 9 Sep 2023
• Time: Tuesday to Friday 11:00-19:00 | Saturday 12:00-17:00
• Venue: Galerie Koo
• Address: 7/F Vogue Building, 67 Wyndham Street, Central, Hong Kong

About the artist – Joshua Leung

Joshua Leung (b. 2004, Hong Kong) is an emerging young artist who specializes in paintings and illustrations. Other than the traditional practice of painting, Joshua also works with installation, digital art, and photography. Over the years, he has participated in various art exhibitions and curatorial projects. He wishes to master his art by commencing his Fine Art degree at Goldsmiths, University of London.

His most recent painting series, “SUNYATA”, reveals a strong sense of self-expression, together with the exploration of humanity and our surroundings through the thickness and repetitiveness of brushstrokes and colors, constructing ideologies from a new dimension influenced by neoexpressionism and city nightscapes. Reminiscing about the views of Hong Kong through his consciousness, his paintings contain bottled memories of the city. The idea that human beings should live in harmony with their surroundings is visible in his works.

About the artist – Kwong Kwok Wai

Painting has been KWONG Kwok Wai’s passion since childhood. Born in 1965, Hong Kong, Kwong learnt about the basic skills of art from his private art teachers, and he kept on practicing and developing his artistic approach all along the way while serving in the journalistic field for 30 years. After witnessing and reporting the ups and downs of Hong Kong, he quitted his job as an Executive Producer in a TV news channel by the end of 2018, where he could let himself fully devote his time and affection to pursue his dream as an artist!

The artist-in-residency program in Vermont Studio Center in 2019 was envisioning — Kwong fell in love with abstraction, and made abstract art as his artistic approach. After the trip, he developed his series “The Map of a Myth”. Having held two solo exhibitions in Hong Kong in 2019 and 2020, Kwong also has his work exhibited in Galeria Azur Berlin in Germany and Boomer Gallery in the United Kingdom. He was one of the finalists of the “Abstract/Experimental Art” competition of the International Artist Publishing, Second Place of the “2022 All Abstraction Online Competition”. His work was also featured in online exhibitions, including TansCultural Exchange of the United States, and Communitas III : Digitale Gemeinschaft of Switzerland.

During his career as a journalist, Kwong has won numerous international awards, including Silver World Medal for Best News Documentary/Special, The New York Festivals, 2008 and Winner (International), News Documentary, RTDNA, The Edward R. Murrow Awards, 2003. With three fulllength novels and one short story collection published, Kwok Wai is also an established writer in Hong Kong.

Source of above information: PR