Thomas C. Chung
Born in 1981 in Hong Kong
Lives and works in Sydney (Australia)
Born in Hong Kong in 1981, Thomas C. Chung is an Australian artist, based in Sydney. In 2004, Chung completed his BFA at the College of Fine Arts at the University of New South Wales. Since 2008, Chung has exhibited in twelve solo exhibitions, and participated in the 2nd Land Art Biennial Mongolia. In 2013, he was invited to the prestigious artist’s residency The Swatch Art Peace Hotel. In 2015, he completed a commissioned artwork for Swatch® to commemorate their Swatch® Club 25th Anniversary. He was also recently invited to represent Australia at the 4th Ghetto Biennale in Haiti, the 9th Shiryaevo Biennale in Russia, and the 3rd Santorini Biennale in Greece. His work is included in various private collections internationally. For the past ten years, he has received numerous artist residencies, travelling to Kemijärvi (Finland), Amsterdam (Netherlands), Shanghai (China) and Zürich (Switzerland). His work has been featured widely in both print and online publications, including: The Daily Telegraph; Australian Art Collector; Yen Magazine; Göteborgs-Posten; Helsingborgs Dagblad; Lapin Kansa; Shanghai Daily; The Bund Magazine; The Huffington Post; and Vanity Fair. On the subject of his artistic practice, Chung states: “My artistic practice is about seeing the world through the eyes of a child, having dealt with their dreams and anxieties in previous years - food, toys, paintings, drawings and installations being the mediums which I have used… Furthering my practice with performances, the knitted objects that are created and used are seen as a motif, representing a specific gesture. Each documented series provides an insight into the human condition, traversing history, landscape and culture.”
Chung delineates the praxis of hid performative work for the Karachi Biennale 2017, What We Left Behind…, “Inspired by an image of a Pakistani attendant named Omera, her gesture of handing out bonbons to orphaned children in Karachi was most heartening. Relaying this conceptual piece from afar I’ll be presenting 100 knitted white candies to commemorate this narrative, my artwork being part sculpture and part performance.” Seen as a sign of kindness and a gesture of openness, these knitted white candies represent a child-like point of view, where a gift is seen as a willingness to receive friendship. The whiteness of the objects is a poignant reminder of innocence and wonder in a world that is often dark and breeds cynicism.
