WANG DONGLING: INK. SPACE. TIME.

Thu 25 May 2023 - Sun 27 August 2023

The Heong Gallery

The art of Wang Dongling (b. 1945, Rudong, Jiangsu Province, China) embodies the transformative potential of individual expression. Wang Dongling is widely recognised as one of the greatest living practitioners of Chinese calligraphy.

For over two millennia, calligraphy has been considered one of the four arts, siyi, that form the essential learning of the Chinese literati. Wang Dongling is a classically trained master calligrapher who, over a 60-year career coinciding with the development of contemporary art in China, has revitalised calligraphy for contemporary audiences.

The artworks presented are written in Wang Dongling’s radical new script style, luanshu, often translated as ‘chaos script’ or ‘entangled writing’. Luanshu places greater importance on the gestural and sensual qualities in the action of writing than on legibility. The free and dynamic curves and lines of Wang Dongling’s luanshu are grounded in, yet unencumbered by, traditional systems of expression.

For Ink. Space. Time., Wang Dongling has drawn upon the Daodejing of legendary Daoist master, Laozi, and the writings of Cambridge theoretical physicist and cosmologist, Stephen Hawking, both of which deal with the nature of the universe, space, and time. Under the hand of Wang Dongling, the texts are rendered incomprehensible, and, thereby, transcend their original meanings. Embodied in the lines, however, is a deep awareness of the cosmic and transformative power of words. The artworks represent pioneering intellectual enquiry across time and the enduring influence of ideas.

Cost: Free