RAG’s Spring Calendar Features Artists Paul Wong and Theodore Wan

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The work of two prominent Chinese-Canadian conceptual artists is featured in the new Richmond Art Gallery (RAG) show Bruises of Unity: Theodore Wan and Paul Wong, 1975-1979.

Running from April 20 to June 30, the exhibition marks the first time the work of the two Vancouverites and their contemporaries has been shown. shown together.

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“I was really interested in bringing these two artists together,” said Michael Dang, guest curator at RAG. “I think it’s interesting how they came to… similar, parallel or complementary practices (but coming from) different backgrounds.”

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Working just a few blocks away in the Main Street area of ​​downtown Vancouver in the 1970s, Wan, who died in 1987, and Wong they turned the lens on themselves in an attempt to highlight and discuss their positions as ‘other’ people. As well as looking at illness, death and the human condition.

“I am excited to show these three works in relation to the work of Theodore Wan,” he said Wong from his Chinatown studio. “It’s this interesting pas de deux in the sense that our works focus on our body.”

At the time, Wan and Wong’s focus on themselves was considered innovative. Now, almost 50 years later, we live in a world dominated by selfies and online creators who put themselves at the center of their content.

“We both focused on ourselves, long before selfies,” Wong said. “Before that, you didn’t focus on yourself… In many ways, using our own bodies versus commercial bodies, stylized bodies, contracted bodies, filtered bodies, that beginning was a break from the mainstream.”

The exhibition is named after the 1976 video 60 Unit by Wong and his collaborator Kenneth Fletcher; Bruise, who documented the “ritualized” extraction of Fletcher’s blood which was then, using a syringe, injected into Wong’s back.

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Combined with a companion piece titled 50/50 (1976/2024), the video will be shown as a newly reissued work titled Blood Brother (1976/2024). Wong’s photographic series 7 Day Activity (1977) will also be presented at the gallery, marking the first time it has been exhibited since 1978.

Wan’s well-known work Bound By Everyday Necessities II, in which he acted as a “patient” in a series of medically accurate photographs, will appear alongside rarely seen objects from his archive, including original drawings, handwritten notes and photocopies of manuals doctors.

All of Wong’s work in this exhibition was produced between 1976 and 1978, during which time the artist was a member of the self-proclaimed “arts gang” The Mainstreeters, which included Kenneth Fletcher, Deborah Fong, Marlene MacGregor, Annastacia McDonald, Charles Rea . and Jeanette Reinhardt.

“Those years were exciting,” Wong said. “That was a really pure period of being an outsider that was like, you know, what the fuck? Nobody is paying attention. The mainstream is not interested, companies are not interested, commercials are not interested, television and film are not interested in what we are doing, which allowed us to do what we want to do. In my case, turn the camera on me and my friends. That became the content, the community and the audience.

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“So now, to have this work at the Richmond Art Gallery in front of a completely new audience, far removed from my original target audience… it’s great.”

Dang hopes that attendees leave the exhibition with an understanding of the rich history and presence of Chinese-Canadian artists in the world of Canadian conceptual art.

“I want younger kids to see themselves in these artists and see that they are not alone,” Dang said. “Seeing that we are part of a lineage, a generation of artists who faced similar things in the ’70s to what we are now.”

It will also be on display at the RAG alongside Unit Bruises Hazel Meyer: The Marble in the Basement.

“Centering a pile of marble remains that possibly once belonged to iconic Canadian artist Joyce Wieland, Meyer’s installation and performance, The Marble in the Basement, unravels questions of power, memory and inheritance by anthropomorphizing a forgotten object from the archive home of this influential Canadian artist.” said a statement from the RAG.

This work by Meyer is part of The Weight of Inheritance, Meyer’s multi-year research project examining Wieland’s legacy.

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