Anna Wong (artist)

Wong was born and raised in the Chinatown district of Vancouver, BC, and belonged to a large family who ran the successful business Modernize Tailors.[2] In 1957 Wong travelled to Hong Kong to study Chinese painting for one year under the notable artist Chao Shao-an of the Lingnan School.[3] In 1966, Wong received an undergraduate degree in printmaking at the Vancouver School of Art (now Emily Carr University of Art and Design).[3] In 1967, she moved to New York City to complete Master's studies at the Pratt Graphics Center (then part of Pratt Institute), where she was hired as a Professor in Studio Arts, working until 1984.

During her career Wong held solo exhibitions at the Consulate General of Canada, New York City (1975),[4][5] the National Art Museum of China, Beijing (1980), the Royal Ontario Museum (1986), the Richmond Art Gallery (1987), and Equinox Gallery, Vancouver, among others. She was included in notable group exhibitions such as Contemporary Canadian Prints: A Survey, alongside works by Gordon Smith, John Esler, Toni Onley, Margot Lovejoy, Richard Lacroix, and others, at the Pratt Graphics Centre;[6] as well as Canadian Contemporary Printmakers at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (1982). In 1982, her work was included in China Today, an exhibition at the Floating Foundation of Photography in New York City. In 1984, her work represented Canada at the Republic of China International Print Exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum in Taiwan.[7] The Vancouver exhibition and research project Chinatown Modern (2002), curated by Steven Tong at Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, included Anna Wong, and addressed the "lack of public recognition of Asian Canadian artists who emerged in Vancouver during the 1960s and 1970s."[8] Wong's work was included in the exhibition The Ornament of a House: Fifty Years of Collecting, at the Burnaby Art Gallery in 2017, and within a publication of the same title.[9] The retrospective exhibition Anna Wong: Traveller on Two Roads[10][11][12][13][14] will tour Canadian galleries between 2018-2021, accompanied by a publication of the same title.

Anna Wong's work is held in public collections in Canada, including the Vancouver Art Gallery, Burnaby Art Gallery,[15] Confederation Centre Art Gallery, Dunlop Art Gallery,[16] and the Art Gallery of Guelph.