Vincent van Gogh, Wheatfield with a Reaper, 1889
Matthew Wong, Coming of Age Landscape, 2018, Private Collection, Courtesy of HomeArt. © Matthew Wong Foundation c/o Pictoright Amsterdam 2023
This spring, discover the exuberant, colourful and mystical work of Matthew Wong at the Van Gogh Museum. This is the first time that Wong’s highly personal oeuvre will be on display in Europe in an exhibition of this size.
The retrospective exhibition Matthew Wong | Vincent van Gogh: Painting as a Last Resort shows the artist’s unique work, well-known and highly regarded throughout the world , in the context of his artistic and personal connection with Van Gogh, whom he saw as one of his most significant sources of inspiration.
Matthew Wong, Unknown Pleasures, 2019, Museum of Modern Art, New York © 2023 Matthew Wong Foundation / Pictoright Amsterdam, 2023. Digital image courtesy of MoMA
The style of the Chinese-Canadian artist Matthew Wong (1984-2019) can best be described as dynamic, colourful and expressive. His lush landscapes exude melancholy. After studying photography, Wong quickly taught himself to paint and was inspired by both European-American and Chinese painting and drawing. Owing to his rapid development, Wong changed painting styles with striking frequency. During short periods, he looked to the works of various artists, including Klimt and Matisse.
It was, however, Vincent van Gogh who played a major role throughout Wong’s entire eight-year career as an artist. In a 2018 interview, Wong named Van Gogh as one of his most important sources of inspiration. Van Gogh’s influence is unmistakable, in terms of use of colour, the thickly applied brushwork and the personal themes in Wong’s work.
Loneliness, isolation and melancholy marked Wong’s life, and are subjects that were channelled through his work. The artist Jonas Wood, another significant example for Wong and a close friend of the artist, even called Wong ‘the modern day Van Gogh’.