“There are no days in our kingdom, only nights. As soon as the sun comes up, our kingdom goes into hiding, for it is an unlawful nation; we have no government and constitution, we are neither recognized nor respected by anyone, our citizenry is little more than rabble.”
- Pai Hsien-yung, Crystal Boys
P·P·O·W is pleased to present Own Alone, Owen Fu’s first solo exhibition with the gallery. In his paintings, which often depict surreal domestic scenes cast in a nocturnal glow, ghostly figures and inanimate objects merge as the distinction between reality and dreams disintegrates. Featuring a new series of paintings on canvas and mixed media, the exhibition reveals the mysterious emotional landscape residing underneath the surface of ordinary life. In hazy brushstrokes of grey, green, brown, and white, Fu’s shadowy characters float in a brew of humor, sincerity, loneliness, joy, emptiness, and hope.
The core concept of Own Alone draws from Pai Hsien-yung’s 1983 novel Crystal Boys. The first Chinese novel to center on themes of homosexuality, the story follows an adolescent boy’s journey to find a new home within the underground gay community of Taiwan after being cast out by his own family. Interweaving motifs from Hsien-yung’s novel with Fu’s own experiences of alienation and immigration from China to the United States, the exhibition combines Eastern and Western painting traditions and art historical tropes to create uncanny compositions in which amorphous figures with no place to call their own flow through crowds, cruising spots under the shadows of park trees, and neon lit misty saunas, to seek connection, solace, and sanctuary.
In reference to this new body of work Fu writes, “Caught between these two worlds, I find myself without a place to truly belong. Where do I fit in? Invisible walls rise between my family and me, filled with truths I wish to speak but cannot express. We are children of the night, wandering under the city’s glow, our fragile light borrowed from moonbeams and streetlamps, never our own.”
Born in Guilin, China, Owen Fu (b. 1988) currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. Fu completed his MFA in 2018 at the ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena, CA, preceded by a BA in Philosophy from the Stony Brook University, New York, NY, and a BA in Fine Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, IL. His recent solo exhibitions include Last Summer, Balice Hertling, Paris, France; Stealing Beauty, Antenna Space, Shanghai, China; Ordinary Things, O-Town House, Los Angeles, CA; After Hours, Balice Hertling, Paris, France; 6 self-portraits and one lamp, Gallery Platform LA, Los Angeles, CA; Bubbly Hills, Mine Project, Hong Kong, China; Small Talk, O-Town House, Los Angeles, CA; No Story, Art Center Main Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; Body Obsession, Art Center PPR, Pasadena, CA; and Emoji Expression, New York Art Expo, New York, NY; among others. He has been featured in group exhibitions at Antenna-tenna, Shanghai, China; Antenna Space, Shanghai, China; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Gagosian Hong Kong, China; and Balice Hertling, Paris, France; among others. His work was included in the 2022 Beijing Biennial, Magic Square: Art and Literature in Mirror Image at Friendship Art Community, Beijing, China. His works belong to the collections of numerous international institutions including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA; Domus Collection, New York, NY; K11 Art Foundation, Hong Kong, China; the START Museum, Shanghai, China; George Economou Collection, Athens, Greece; Aïshti Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon; and the Juan and Patricia Vergez Collection, Buenos Aires, Argentina; among others.