About

Artist statement

My work reclaims the female body and bears witness to the spirit. A major throughline in my work is the wound or scar and the power of taking back the night by healing the scar.   Creating works of beauty in brokenness is my highest act of resistance.

I make fiber and drawing based installations, assemblages and works on paper to memorialize my mother whom I lost to alcoholism and domestic violence when I was 15.  These works range in size from intimate pieces to larger immersive works.  I use a variety of fabric and flexible drawing surfaces as my medium, applying the skills passed down to me from my mother who was a talented seamstress.

 The sexual violence my mother and I each experienced in our lives led to a self-loathing of my body, cultivating the anorexia and mental illness I struggled with as a young woman. Now, I stitch and draw as a journey towards wholeness, both for myself and for my mother’s memory.

I started to work with fiber installation in 2017.  I became attracted to working with light, reflective, transparent fabrics because it reminds me of the permeable separation between the living and the dead.  In my current series “quilt suspensions,” I use a flat felled seam technique with transparent fabric.  I combine these ephemeral materials with LED strip lighting and diffusion film as a proxy for my mother’s spirit. The layers of pieced fabric are suspended over this light-spirit as a shroud or mourning cloth.  Inspired by Chinese funeral customs, the quilt layers become burial blankets that are offered by the children of the deceased and layered upon their loved ones.

BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT

Holly Wong lives and works in San Francisco, California. She was educated at the San Francisco Art Institute where she graduated with a Master of Fine Arts with a concentration in New Genres. Holly creates installations, assemblages and works on paper, integrating non-traditional approaches with more traditional sewing techniques associated with the history of women. Her approach is both non-conventional but also deeply rooted in her history and culture. She has been awarded visual arts grants from the Integrity: Arts and Culture Association, Barbara Deming Memorial fund, the George Sugarman Foundation, the Puffin Foundation, and a Gerbode Foundation purchase award. She has had over 70 group exhibitions and 10 solo exhibitions.  She is represented by SLATE Contemporary Gallery in Oakland, California, ELLIO Fine Art in Houston, TX, and is a member of A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn, New York.  

Thank you for visiting this website.  Should you have questions, comments or feedback, please visit the “Contact” page to contact Holly directly.  

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RESUME

Education:

1995
Master of Fine Arts, San Francisco Art Institute
1993
Bachelor of Fine Arts, San Francisco Art Institute

SLATE Contemporary Gallery, Oakland, CA
ELLIO Fine Art, Houston, TX
A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY (National Member)

Solo exhibitions:

2023
Curfman Gallery, Colorado State University at Fort Collins, CO
Schaefer International Gallery, Maui Arts & Cultural Center, Maui, HI (2 Person Show)
Anagram Gallery (online solo artist feature)
2021
SLATE Contemporary Gallery, Oakland, CA
2019
Evanston Art Center, Evanston, IL
2018
Visual Art Exchange (VAE) CUBE space, Raleigh, NC
2017
The Carving Studio & Sculpture Center, West Rutland, VT
2010
Talley Gallery, Bemidji State University, Bemidji, MN
2009
Laredo Center for the Arts, Laredo, Texas
College of the Sequoias, Visalia, California
2008
Puffin Room, (2 person show) New York, NY

selected group exhibitions:

2023
“Frayed Stories of Life, Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA
 “6th Annual National Juried Exhibition,” Wausau Museum of Contemporary Art, Wausau, WI
“Meeting of Makers, Merging of Space,” Murray State University, Clara Eagle Gallery, Murray, KY
“48 Pillars 2023,” Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA
“Monumentally Fragile,” College of the Desert, Palm Desert, CA (3 Person show)
“San Francisco Art Market” Public Project presented by SLATE Contemporary
“Hang Time” Bridgette Mayer Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“Magic Hour: Fiber and Film”, St. Kate – The Arts Hotel, Milwaukee, WI
“National Members Exhibition,”  A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY “California Generations,”  ELLIO Fine Art Gallery, Houston, NY

2022
“48 Pillars,” Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA
“Rise,” Create Magazine, January 2022 online exhibition
“Out of Line,” Court Tree Collective Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Serenity: One with Nature,” UCSF National Center of Excellence in Women’s Health, San Francisco
“Structures of Feeling,” A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“THEORY FORWARD: Shape, Line, Color, Surface / Texture” O’Hanlon Center for the Arts, Mill Valley, CA
“Traditions Evolve,” (online group exhibition), Surface Design Association, Sante Fe, NM
“Art for AIDS,” Drawing Room, San Francisco, CA
“Meeting of Makers, Merging of Space,” Jack Olson Gallery, Northern Illinois University, IL
“ArtSpan SF Open Studios Exhibition,” Group Exhibition at SOMArts Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA
“1st Anniversary Exhibition,”  ELLIO Fine Art Gallery, Houston, TX

2021
“12th Annual Drawing Discourse,” University of North Carolina, Asheville, NC
“Remnants,” Wisconsin Museum of Quilts & Fiber Arts, Cedarburg, WI
“The Bones of Building” (online group exhibition) Surface Design Assoc., Santa Fe, NM
“Fractal Nature,” A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Extraction: Art on the Edge of the Abyss,” part of artists@Home, A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Movement+Space,” Dana L. Wiley Gallery, Dayton, OH
“Strange Nature,” (online group exhibition) Artist Alliance, Santa Fe, NM
“fu·tur·ol·o·gy,” (online group exhibition), Ely Center for Contemporary Art, New Haven, CT
“Variance,” (online group exhibition), I Like Your Work Podcast
“Bounty” (online group exhibition) Rhombus Space, Brooklyn, NY
“ArtSpan SF Open Studios Exhibition,” Group Exhibition at SOMArts Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA
“Weave, Bundle, Cut and Layer,” Group Exhibition at Root Division, San Francisco, CA
“Hope & Possibility,” Benefit Exhibition, Bridgette Mayer Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
“Formalism: the Show,” Ice House Gallery, Petaluma

2020
“The de Young Open,” de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA
“Domestic Disturbance,” Mobilia Gallery and Textile Society of America, Boston, MA
“Suffrage100,” The Mercy Gallery, The Loomis Chaffee School, Windsor, CT
“Scythia” 13th International Textile Art Biennial , Ivano-Frankivs’k, Ukraine
“Process and Material” Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, IL
“USPS Mail Project,” Pelham Art Center, Pelham, NY and Sunset Art Studios, Dallas, TX
“Congruence,” (online group exhibition) I Like Your Work Summer 2020
“Changing a Point of View,” (online group exhibition) All SHE Makes
“Un/Feeling,” (online group exhibition) Feminist Art Museum
“Women Rising,” The Drawing Room, San Francisco, CA
“Art in Neighborhoods,” Counterpulse and Artspan, San Francisco, CA
“Tactile Surfaces,” SFWA Gallery, San Francisco, CA
“Forever is Composed of Nows,” A.I.R. Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Current Threads” (online group exhibition) Surface Design Association, Santa Fe, NM
“Bay Area Locals,” Mirus Gallery, San Francisco, CA
“SNAP!”  Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA

awards & honors:

2022
Top 5 Artist Selection, San Francisco Open Studios/ArtSpan

2021
Top 5 Artist Selection, San Francisco Open Studios/ArtSpan
Finalist, SFOS Campaign Collateral Competition, San Francisco Open Studios/ArtSpan

2020
Top 5 Artist Selection, San Francisco Open Studios/ArtSpan
Small Event Award, Surface Design Association. Funded to support 2021 “Remnants” exhibition at Wisconsin Museum of Quilts and Fiber Arts

2019
Integrity: Arts & Culture Association, Grant Recipient
Juror’s Choice Award: SFWA Gallery “Celebrating Women” exhibition

2018
Juror’s Choice Award: SFWA Gallery “What Brings Us Joy” exhibition

2007
George Sugarman Foundation, Grant Recipient
Honorable Mention, “Visual Rhythms/Ritmos Visuales,” Torpedo Factory Art Center, Target Gallery, Alexandria, Virginia
Puffin Foundation Ltd., Visual Art Grant Recipient

2006
Money for Women/Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, Grant Recipient

2005
George Sugarman Foundation, Grant Recipient
“Making a Difference for Women Award”.  Selected for award based on artwork that promoted the cause of women.  San Francisco Chapter, Soroptimist International

2004
Puffin Foundation Ltd., Visual Art Grant Recipient

1998
Gerbode Foundation Purchase Award

1996
Western Arts Federation (WESTAF) Honorable Mention in New Genres

1989
Presidential Scholar in the Arts

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