MIN WONG (NSW)

Wong is preoccupied with the forces of wellness, spiritualism and consumerism and their sympathetic influence on both the individual and society at large. Tracking the emergence of New Age Western Spiritualism in the 1970s as a counterculture, Wong traces its eventual trickle down into mainstream society in the present day, where it has been co-opted by consumerism. Wong’s practice inhabits this space of tension between the search for the divine versus the drive of capitalism. Within this dichotomy there is also a balance between criticality and sincerity.

Wong’s exhibition Lone Wolf (2022) greets the viewer with an eerie hologram of a floating Nike Decades sneaker –  a work titled Away Team, created in collaboration with artist Brie Trenerry. It references the final uniform of the members of the Heaven's Gate cult, who in 1997 committed mass ritualistic suicide, every detail of which was meticulously arranged, down to a specific style of Nike sneaker donned by the entire group. This apparition also resembles a contemporary god, the brand Nike (“Victory") as it rules supreme with an omnipresent eye in the cult of fitness. Away Team comes to represent the sneaker as an embryo floating in the amniotic fluid of potential self-betterment and discipline, whether referring to the spiritual (Heaven’s Gate) or the physical (CrossFit). The Argento-esque palette of theatrical monochromatic lights conjures an association with horror and occultism. At the centre of the installation, slender metal structures interject into the space, acting as simultaneous obstacle and ornament. Ropes languish and bars protrude from their scaffolding to suggest a workout circuit or interior flourish. The installation simultaneously references a gymnasium and a temple, and worshippers of both exude the same fervent devotion.

Wong’s sculptures and installations are immersive, creating their own environments that evoke associations with yoga studios, shared flexible workspaces, or cathedrals. Wong has a distinctly embodied relationship to the content of her work, she is not interested in a purely critical and removed position but more so in how these energies influence our lives and spirit. She is a disciple of Crossfit and previously Bikram yoga. As a child, she came into close contact with an Evangelist church. She tells me she has a strong belief in the collective and the power of community. To view her work in relation to these facts brings forth an understanding of the artist as a conduit. Wong has stated that often the guru of any movement such as a cult, alternative church, or fitness trend ultimately becomes “subject to their own desire, money and power.” In doing so they are reduced to a cog in the humbling system of the spiritual: the God and the disciple are one in the same, and a karmic (ego) death is always imminent.

Wong’s Samstag Scholarship will be used towards participation in an MFA program at the Braunschweig University of Art in Germany. There she will further investigate spiritualism with a specific investigation into ancient Western spiritual practices including paganism, witches, the occult and satanism.

Essay by Gemma Topliss, September 2023.

Gemma Topliss is a writer and artist from Naarm/Melbourne.