This spring, Arsenal Contemporary Art Montreal is pleased to welcome Opal Mae Ong for a residency. The American artist will be in preparation (Apr 5, 2022 - Feb 28, 2023) for her upcoming solo exhibition at Arsenal Contemporary Art New York in March and April 2023.

About

Opal Mae Ong practice includes monochromatic drawing using graphite on paper as well as painting with acrylics and gouache on canvas. With these materials Ong is able to make meaning of opaquely felt experiences such as unnameable desire, complicated grief and personal trauma. She borrows symbolic imagery and invents figures that participate in a reality not too far from her own. The work may appear allegorical but it never arrives at any kind of moral. Instead the figures suggest mourning, enact self-punishment, they hide, follow ghosts, lose limbs and hold things dear.

Opal Mae Ong was born in 1994 in Los Angeles. Graduated from Hunter College and the School of Visual Arts, she lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Her recent exhibitions include a group show at She Bam Art (Leipzig, Germany), two-person booth at Spring Break Art Fair (Los Angeles, California), and an online solo exhibition with Arsenal Contemporary Art New York (United States).