Joey Leung Ka Yin


Joey Leung Ka-yin is a contemporary gongbi artist in Hong Kong. Trained in the meticulous style of traditional Chinese fine brush painting, Leung's works combine tradition with modern subject matter. Leung's work is subjective and personal as she uses her art to comment on urban city life and its related issues in a witty and imaginative way. Leung's works reflect her strong desire to confront conventional habits and beliefs in order to present new perspective and provoke alternative interpretations of modern life.
In most of her paintings, the combination of the subject, the scenery and the rhythmic doggerel evokes a poetic space for imagination in the viewers. The girl, which is a dominant motif, in Leung's paintings is imbued with agency to freely interact with the other objects and the environment. It is a reversal of the long-held notion of women taking a backseat and are often the objects to be looked at by men.
WWW leungkayin.com

Early life and education

Joey Leung received her Bachelor of Arts and Master of Fine Arts from the Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong.
At the University, she started to pick up gongbi painting from 1998. Although this realistic technique of ancient Chinese painting is generally considered unimaginative and inexpressive, Leung imbues in it a modern spirit through her choice of subject matter, media and format.

Style

If gongbi painting that often depicts birds and flowers is generally looked upon as uninspired and rooted in the nostalgic, Joey Leung has provided a new twist to it as she integrates tradition with popular culture in her works. Drawing upon her personal experiences of city life, her artworks often represent an ironic twist to mundane everyday happenings.
The juxtaposition of words and images in Leung's paintings recalls both the Chinese art form of Lianhuanhua popular in China in the 1920s as well as the pop art of Japanese comics in Hong Kong prevalent in the 80s & 90s. Using the sequential structure, it provides a strong narration in her paintings whereby the viewer can derive meanings from both text and images. To comprehend Leung's paintings, it is important that viewer understands the riddle-like doggerels that she writes in Cantonese, the vernacular language to Hong Kong.
Leung also expands the art media in her painting to include Chinese ink, gouache, acrylic, pencil, colored pencil, ball pen, drawing pen and markers.

Works

Leung's most recent works include Goddess of Luo River《 洛神》, Fragments of Time 《時間的碎片 》and The Listless Lion《獅子沒精神》that she completed in 2017. In her Pool of Muscle 《人間肉池》, it comprises a series of three paintings titled Dream Balcony, Scenery of the Moment and Firework is Everywhere.
In 2015 Leung produced six paintings: Something that Mr. Chow didn't Mention《周公沒說》,Worrywart And The Cat with Bell《 自尋煩惱的人與掛鈴貓 》,Expired Memory: Weeping Willow And Octopus 《過期的記憶：垂柳與八爪魚 》,Transient 1 《無常她 1 》Transient 2 《無常她 2 》and Wait a Moment《等等 》.
In 2014, her works include Romantic Encounters Happen Only in Movies 《浪漫偶遇只在電影發生 》,Oil fish Melon Soup with Egg Drop 《牛油魚瓜蛋花湯 》,The Despised Monday《被嫌棄的星期一 》, Chicken Stock is Powerless to Help 《鷄汁無力救 》.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

Joey Leung won the prestigious Y.S. Hui Arts Award for her mixed media work in 2000 upon her graduation. In the same year, she held her first solo exhibition Idling Away a Second in Galerie Martini, Hong Kong.
From 2008 to 2014, Leung held three solo exhibitions in the Grotto Fine Arts, Hong Kong and one in Aquvii Tokyo in Japan. Her exhibition Beyond Presumption 《 那些人我以為的事》 is about imaginary stories presented in the first-person or third-person narrative to express her feelings about the world she lives in.
Leung's paintings in Cloudy Fairy-tales《陰天的童話》 were inspired by figures from famous fairy tales in the Western world like Snow White, Cinderella as a way to comment on her observations of city life and its people. This is followed by her Garden of Hesitation 《猶豫園》 and Unpoetic Poems 《不詩意詩集》 at Grotto Fine Art, Hong Kong.

Joint exhibitions

Joey Leung is active in many joint exhibitions held both in Hong Kong and overseas.
2015
  • Walking In The Dreams
  • Plenitude in Commonality--- Invitational Exhibition of MFA Graduates in Chinese Media of CUHK
  • 〔PURPLE〕: women of mankind
2014
  • She Looks Blue by Cold Ears Factory---Eastman Cheng + Joey Leung
  • OrienTellers Exhibited digital print-out replicas
2013
  • The 8th International Ink Painting Biennial of Shenzhen
  • Now & Then: Contemporary Ink vs Antiquities
  • New Ink - An Exhibition Of Ink Art By Post 1970 Artists From The YiQingZhai Collection
  • Art Basel Hong Kong
  • Fete en Papier
  • Fotanian Open Studios 2013
2012
  • Connect Hong Kong Contemporary Art Exhibition and Hong Kong Cancer Fund Charity Auction.
  • Painting On and On : The Repository of Coherent Babbles
  • Desire - Sculptures and paintings by Eastman Cheng and Joey Leung Ka-yin
  • Picks of the Harvest 2012
  • Cracking Creamy Face ‧ Cotton Landscape - Fotanian Open Studios 2012
2011
  • Homeroom
  • Vision - Hong Kong Contemporary Art Exhibition and Hong Kong Cancer Fund Charity Auction
  • Octopus- Nine Contemporary Artists from Hong Kong
  • Legacy and Creations - "Ink Art vs Ink Art"
  • HK ARTcomics 2011
  • Fotanian Open Studios 2011
2010
  • The 7th International Ink Painting Biennial of Shenzhen
  • You Are Here, I Am Not - From Ho Siu Kee to Kong Chun Hei
  • The Linear Dimension - Contemporary Hong Kong Art
  • My Humble House - An Exhibition of A New Generation
  • Legacy & Creations – Ink Vs Ink Art Exhibition
  • Fotanian Open Studios 2010
2009
  • Shore – International Literary and Visual Art Exhibition cum Charity Sale
  • Ink Contemporary: ReXPERIMENT
  • Urban Spirituality - Contemporary Hong Kong Art
  • Liners’ Paradox
  • Hong Kong‧Water‧Ink‧Colour – Exhibition of Chinese Paintings 2009
2008
  • The Pivotal Decade: Hong Kong Art 1997-2007
  • Fotanian:Fotan Artists Open Studios 2008
2007
  • Ink Non Ink - joint exhibition
  • Think After Ink - A new interpretation of brush and ink by Hong Kong Artists
  • 6 Degrees of Separation
  • The Pivotal Decade: Hong Kong Art 1997-2007
  • Autobiobliophiles – joint exhibition
  • Brushwork - Fotanian Open Studio 2007
2006
  • away – joint exhibition
  • The Art of CUHK 06
2005
  • City Art Trail – joint exhibition
2001
  • Hong Kong Art Month - joint exhibition
2000
  • Salon d'hiver iii - joint exhibition
  • At the Posts - Graduate Exhibition of the Department of Fine Arts, CUHK
  • Enough ． In Love – Law Man Lok, Leung Ka Yin Collaboration Exhibition
1999
  • Last 7 days - joint exhibition of mixed media
  • “…” Ko Siu Hong, Leung Ka Yin, Wong Chung Yan- joint exhibition

Publication

Book

2012
HONG KONG ARTISTS - 20 Portraits, Edited by Cordelia and Christoph Noe, Published by Verlag für moderne Kunst, pg122-129

Periodical

2013
Wang Ruosi, Covering Danger with Poetic Veil. Art and Design February 2013, Issue 158. pp 70–77
2011
Lai Tsz-yuen, The Logic of Sense: A Review on Joey Leung Ka-yin's Drawings. Twenty-First Century. December 2011, Issue128. pp 88–91
2008
劉浩敏，「似是而非」的現代工筆。C for Culture. September 2008, Issue5. pp 40–41

Collection

Hong Kong Museum of Art
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford University