Photo: Phillip Chin
BIO
Lives and works in Vancouver, BC, Canada
Interdisciplinary Visual and Media Artist and Curator
Paul Wong is a pioneering figure, known for his innovative work in visual and media art. With a career spanning over five decades, Wong has continuously pushed the boundaries of storytelling, working outside mainstream conventions making art for site-specific spaces and screens of all sizes. He is an award winning artist and curator and founder of several artist-run groups, and organizing events, festivals, conferences and public interventions since the 1970s. Wong has produced projects throughout North America, Europe and Asia.
“a bold pioneer in Canadian visual and media art. For fifty years and counting, Paul has been the creator of ground-breaking, large-scale public art installations that challenge stereotypes and our notions of belonging,” “Throughout his long career, he has modelled a commitment to building community and advocacy which has been influential on newer generations of media artists. As a visual and media artist, storyteller, community-builder, advocate and curator, Paul fiercely embodies the qualities of the Fire Horse Award, as he dedicates his talent and energy to breaking down barriers, uplifting Asian Canadian communities and sparking cultural change.”
– Ali Kazimi, Keith Lock and Hannah Sung, 2024 Fire Horse Award jury.
“a creator of events, performances, videos, pictures, sculptures and cultural institutions, Wong has made himself a virtual intersection of activities both solo and collaborative, affirmative and critical, stoic and ludic.”
– Michael Turner, Preview Magazine February/March 2019
“In Paul Wong, the Fire Horse Award jury has chosen a one-of-a-kind artist whose work—which never shied away from exploring his queer, Asian and Canadian identities”
– Deanna Wong, Reel Asian’s Executive Director.
Wong was the winner of the Bell Canada Award in Video Art 1992, the first recipient of the Transforming Art Award from the Asian Heritage Foundation 2002 and the inaugural winner of the Trailblazer Expressions Award in 2003, created by Heritage Canada, National Film Board and CHUM Limited. In 2005 he received the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Art. In 2008 was awarded Best Canadian Film or Video at the Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival. In 2016, the Audain Prize for Lifetime Achievement in Visual Arts. In 2023 he was presented with an the Outstanding Artist Award from the Federation of Gay Games. In the same year Wong was awarded an Honorary Doctorate Degree from Emily Car University of Art and Design (ECUAD). In 2024 he was awarded the Reel Asian Fire Horse Award, which recognizes trailblazers in the Asian Canadian media arts who have demonstrated leadership, excellence and innovation. He was appointed the University of British Columbia, Artist in Residence (2024-2025).
A recent project 身在唐人街/OCCUPYING CHINATOWN was inspired by hundreds of letters and familial artefacts of his late mother Suk Fong Wong. During a year-long residency at Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Gardens Wong created a series of exhibitions, public art pieces, artist talks, events, workshops. The Occupying Chinatown book was a finalist for 2022 City of Vancouver Book Award. www.occupyingchinatown.com.
Current projects include The Prop House Film commissioned by the grunt gallery and show on the Mount Pleasant Community Art Screen May 2024-2025. In production is Send Back an experimental documentary, a correspondence with the motherland (China) that combines vintage super 8 film and HD video.
He is the Artistic Director and curator of On Main Gallery (On The Cutting Edge Productions Society). He is currently curating the photography retrospective Enemy Alien: Tamio Wakayama for the Vancouver Art Gallery opening in March 2026.