Flo Oy Wong

Flo Oy Wong

Website: http://www.flo-oy-wongartist.com

 408-739-8951

   835 Elmira Drive, Sunnyvale, CA

My art is symbolic of this country’s multiple canons. My work is significant because it inserts little-known chronicles into the cultural landscape. Influenced by the contemporary artists, Faith Ringgold, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and Joseph Cornell, I make art that speaks of personal, family, community, cultural, and historical stories. To retrieve these narratives I interview people that I find heroic in order to explore disquieting matters that transform me and viewers to a place of healing, connecting, and understanding. I use cloth rice sacks, sequins, beads, old suitcases, scanned photographs, magazine text, Chinese funeral paper, flags of the United States, needle, and thread to create my mixed-media installations. In acknowledgement of my identity as an American of Chinese descent I frequently use Chinese and English text in my work.

Featured on KQED’s Spark: http://www.kqed.org/arts/programs/spark/profile.jsp?essid=4392

MORE ABOUT THE ARTIST

What did the Fellowship or Laureate mean to you at the time you received it?

When I received the Fellowship I was validated for working at the intersection of art and history.

What do you do now? Has your art evolved or changed?

Right after my 2008 Artist Fellowship award, my solo exhibition ?70/30: Seventy Years of Life, Thirty years of Art? opened at the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center (APICC) of San Francisco. While my textile/installation works are still being shown locally and across the country, I have begun to write poetry. My art has evolved to including poetry along with my visual work. To see my work, go to the gallery pages of my website: www.flo-oy-wongartist.com

What is one piece of advice you would give to an emerging artist?

Make work which reveals the depth of your talent - do not rush what you create.

Briefly, how would you describe the state of the arts locally, as well as national and beyond?

Growing but challenged.