Issac Chong Wai
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Isaac Chong Wai is an artist working between Berlin and Hong Kong. The conceptual, political, and performative qualities of Isaac Chong Wai’s practice are incorporated by an interdisciplinary approach, processing the exigency of societal shifts and global phenomena. His subtle, poetic, and yet critical works infiltrate the systems of meanings, inviting viewers to reexamine his edited representations of, among others, the body, powerlessness, violence, collectivism, leaderlessness and mourning. He works across a range of media, comprising performance, sculpture, video, painting and photography.
He had solo exhibitions at Zilberman Selected, Istanbul and Una Boccata d’Arte, commissioned by Fondazione Elpis in collaboration with Galleria Continua, Castiglione di Sicilia (2022); Bilsart, Istanbul (2021); Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong (2019); Zilberman, Berlin (2019); Kunstraum München, Munich (2018); Goethe Institut, Hong Kong (2018); Bauhaus Museum, Weimar (2016).
His work has been shown at Bundeskunsthalle Bonn and ifa-Galerie Berlin (2022); Federal Foreign Office (2021); National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA), Seoul, Innsbruck Biennial and IFFR, Rotterdam (2020); Museum of Contemporary Art in Taipei and Guangdong Times Museum in Guangzhou (2019); M+ Museum and Para Site in Hong Kong and Times Art Center Berlin (2018); Stiftung Brandenburger Tor and Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin (2017); Deutsche Künstlerbund, Berlin and Gwangju Media Art Festival (2016); Kunstfest Weimar and Macura Museum, Serbia (2015); Moscow Biennale for Young Art in Museum of Moscow (2014).
Chong was awarded NEUSTARTplus-Stipendium für freiberufliche bildende Künstler:innen, Stiftung Kunstfonds, Bonn (2023); INITIAL 2 Special Grant–New Cooperations together with Dagmar Aigner, Akademie der Künste, Berlin (2022); Research Stipends, Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe, Berlin (2021); Fellowship at Kulturakademie Tarabya, Goethe-Institut and Federal Foreign Office, Istanbul and Talent Award at Jutta Cuny-Franz Memorial Award, Kunstpalast Museum, Düsseldorf (2020); Warsteiner Blooom Award, Düsseldorf (2019); and “Artist Scholarship Program,” Burger Collection, Hong Kong (2016).
He graduated from Academy of Visual Arts at Hong Kong Baptist University with a BA in Visual Arts and Bauhaus-Universität in Weimar, Germany, with a MFA in Public Art and New Artistic Strategies.