Jason Wing is a young Aboriginal artist from the western Sydney suburb of Blacktown, which has a relatively high Aboriginal population. Wing’s father is Chinese (Cantonese) and his mother is an Aboriginal woman from the Biripi people in the Upper Hunter region of New South Wales. Since graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts at Sydney’s College of Fine Arts in 1998, Wing has steadily emerged in the Sydney and national art scene as a versatile artist who explores issues of bi-cultural and Indigenous political identity, environmental awareness and spirituality with a street-wise flair (owing in part to his use of stencil printing) and strong commitment to community engagement.
The artist statement on Wing’s website begins: 'My art is inspired by the way my life has thrown up apparent contradictions. It is the place between the contradictory energies that creates a unique space for me to carve out who I am as an artist and a man.’ He then goes on to explain the stark differences between his father’s business/urban influences and the rural/non-materialist motivations of his mother’s Aboriginal way of life. 'Two things in opposition can become the base of a pattern’, explains Wing, and we can see the visual manifestation of this philosophy in a mural work such as Rebirth (2008) which incorporates a cupid and cloud scrolls in a graffiti aesthetic of spraypaint streaks and drips. In Migration (2007), the coming together of opposites is more literal, with two cupid-like figures (one coloured, the other white) at each end of the picture, joined by a throng of 'migratory’ black birds (magpies and crows) which stream out of a hole in each of their chests. At once joyous, poetic and redemptive, Migration is characteristic of Wing’s particular style, as is the painting’s use of cupid and bird motifs. The artist explains that this cupid image is a loose self-portrait-as-child.
Wing supplemented his Fine Art degree with a Bachelor of Graphic Design at Sydney Graphics College in 2002. Indeed one can also see this duality in his work; the blend of the more expressive/experimental visual artist with the message-conscious cool and focus of the graphic designer. It was a few years after formal study before Wing’s exhibiting life began, in 2005, as part of a group show in his hometown Blacktown Arts Centre '10th Annual Blacktown Art Show’; an auspicious start which earned him two awards, as the best local artist and a Highly Commended. In the next year, things started accelerating. He was selected to show in Sydney Art Fair’s 'Off The Wall’ platform for emerging artists, a distinction repeated in 2008 with 'Off The Wall’ representation at Art Fairs in Brisbane and Melbourne. In 2006, he also participated in a number of group shows in Sydney galleries (Newington Armoury, Orson and Blake Gallery, Gallery 4A, Blacktown Art Centre for their 'Crossing Cultures’ exhibition) and Adelaide (Green Hill Galleries). Significantly, 2009 he also collaborated with internationally renowned Taiwanese/American artist Lee Mingwei on Mingwei’s solo exhibition, 'Tourist’, at Sydney’s Sherman Gallery.
It was in 2008 that this researcher first came to know about Wing’s work. In writing on Wing for Art Monthly Australia’s very first 'Em File’ (a feature profiling emerging artists, commencing in April ’08) I noted that this 'emerging’ label might be wearing thin, given his Art Fair guernseys and a 'rising star’ recognition in 'belle’ magazine back in 2006. Still, at that time he was without commercial gallery representation in Australia and yet to stage a solo exhibition. This looks set to change in 2009, with a solo exhibition scheduled for Melbourne’s Arc One gallery in August. In 2008, Wing demonstrated his versatility with work in two shows that departed from his 2D stencil-based pieces. As part of curator Djon Mundine’s 2008 Campbelltown Art Centre exhibition, 'Ngadhu Ngulili Ngeaninyagu Premier State’, a survey exhibition of art by NSW Kooris, Wing created a commanding installation, 'Sign of the Times’, effectively a leitmotif for this show, which comprised an assembly of road signage along with other streetscape paraphernalia including CCTV cameras ('surveilling’ the gallery spectators), a street-cum-totem pole and a real estate sign boasting 'Prem1er Real Estate’ with a map of NSW 'For Sale’. The installation was mounted on an earthen base in the shape of NSW.
Earlier in 2008, Wing was selected to present work in the 'Jesus Walks Project’, a public sculptural event coinciding with the Catholic Church’s World Youth Day spectacle which took place in Sydney, July 2008. With a brief to determine 'how relevant is faith in today’s society’, and a life-size fibreglass model of Jesus, Wing installed an interactive LED message panel on a black Jesus and utilised the glib, catchy language of commerce to attract attention and make viewers wonder about (and even input) their own idea of faith in a logo-centric world. The project was also a fundraiser for Father Chris Riley’s Youth Off The Streets program.
That Wing can exhibit in member shows for Sydney’s Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Co-operative and Gallery 4A Asia-Australia Art Centre speaks volumes about the fluidity of self-identity and also about a certain multicultural maturity. That he is determined to enlist his art in the quest for greater good is shown by its earnest political- and community-mindedness, as well as in his work teaching art therapy to children with disabilities.
- Writers:
- Maurice O'Riordan
- Date written:
- 2009
- Last updated:
- 2011
