Muriwai Arts Trail 2010
Brent Wong
Born in Otaki in 1945, Brent Wong experimented widely with different styles and media and his painting was initially influenced by Kandinsky, Klee and Turner (whose love of nature and the sky remain an inspiration). He explored the possibilities of black and white, watercolour and oil painting, before beginning to paint in acrylic in 1965. Images of his paintings are featured in most major publications on New Zealand art including Gil Docking's '200 Years of New Zealand Painting' and Gordon Brown and Hamish Keith's book 'An Introduction to New Zealand Painting 1839-1980.' He has also been featured in articles in 'Art New Zealand' (1978) and 'Art International' (1975) magazines and has also exhibited widely in galleries throughout New Zealand including in the 1970s at the Barry Lett and Peter Webb Galleries in Auckland, and at the Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt. During the late 1960s Wong perfected his remarkable draughting skills learnt from an early fascination with architecture. In 1967 he became interested in the work of American artist Andrew Wyeth and began a series of interior paintings featuring still life subjects. By the end of that decade these were followed by exterior scenes dominated by blue skies and architectural forms, which became increasingly surreal in appearance, floating across his painted skies. Between 1972 and 1977 these architectural constructions disappear and are replaced in his paintings by the predominance of landscape, buildings and clouds. Since the 1980s while still retaining his distinctive surreal style, the light in his paintings has become more diffused in tone and his forms further simplified.
In 2008 the artist abandoned painting to explore music composition, a field which had fascinated him since the beginning of his painting career.
