Object(ing): The Art/Design of Tobias Wong

The Museum of Vancouver is pleased to present the first time solo exhibition of internationally acclaimed Vancouver-born artist Tobias Wong who committed suicide in 2010 at the age of 30. Wong’s work defied categorization, as he engaged with a range of art processes from installations, performances, and furniture making to product and fashion design. He was cheeky, playful, witty, and clever. He appropriated, manipulated, manufactured, mass-produced, and re-issued objects, pouring new meanings into them. Like many pioneers, his art both seduced and upset. Object(ing): The Art/Design of Tobias Wong opened yesterday and is on view until February 24, 2013 at The Museum of Vancouver. 

tobias wong / BULLET PROOF

Bullet Proof Rose Broach

Arguably contemporary design's most nimble provocateur, Tobias Wong staged his debut in 2001 and continued — until his untimely death at age 35 in 2010 — to produce an extraordinary body of work he designated "paraconceptual" and "postinteresting." Drawing inspiration from various anti-art practices, Wong probed and subverted design's complicity with the culture of late capitalism, exposing its smoke and mirrors while exercising his own sleight of hand. With a unique mix of critical intelligence, courage, sincerity, and mischief, as well as a cadre of talented collaborators, Wong steadily pursued his obsession with the interplay of anxiety and consumerism in the years following 9/11. The allure of luxury goods; the cult of the celebrity designer; the stubborn failure of objects to provide the benefits demanded of them: these are among the concerns he explored across a protean body of work that encompassed objects, furniture, lighting, jewelry, installation, and performance. This is the first in-depth presentation of Wong's work in a museum and will be presented alongside an exhibition drawn from the permanent collection called ParaDesign. On view till June 19, 2011 at the San Francisco Museum of Modern art. www.sfmoma.org