Wong Hoy Cheong: 'Migrants' series

Wong Hoy Cheong has said: 'I grew up listening to stories. Stories told by my father and mother, grandmothers, aunties and uncles. They were stories of remembrance layered with wonder and pain, conflict and reconciliation, mystery and miracle. My drawings ['Migrants' series] take these stories, rich with images, as a starting point. I am interest in how the histories of people are made; how the individual "I" becomes the collective "I" and how the easily forgotten dreams of one person becomes the dreams of a people. I am interested in the migration of people, their paths, their continuous ebb and flow, from land to land searching for a better life and their eventual indigenisation in a new homeland.'¹

The three-panelled drawing In search of faraway places is the fifth and final work of the 'Migrants' series and reflects a highly personal exploration of identity and marginalisation in contemporary Malaysia. The series is based on Wong Hoy Cheong's family history. The son of a second generation Chinese immigrant of working class origins who married into a wealthy Straits Chinese family, Wong Hoy Cheong probes the complex split of cultural allegiances of Straits Chinese identity and the Sino-Malay-British colonial influences that have shaped it. Using a medium that recalls the sepia-toned photographs of a family album, he creates images that resonate with references to migration and displacement, class and context, prejudice and identity of past generations.

Wong Hoy Cheong originally planned four works in the series; however, the sudden illness of his mother led to In search of faraway places. With relatives flying in from various countries Hoy Cheong reflected on migration, cultural allegiances and the aspirations of his family. Many Malaysians (like Wong's family) have been educated overseas and work outside Malaysia. In search of faraway places includes well dressed people in boats armed with university certificates, seeking new opportunities. However, the people in the earlier 'Migrants' works, the older generation, remain in Malaysia becoming increasingly frail. In this series Hoy Cheong employs a visual device of 'windows' in the work's narrative. Within In search of faraway places one can discern a number of such windows including the rock band, The Beatles, the Merdeka (Malaysian independence), a caged bird said to be a common feature in Indonesian communities in Malaysia, and rubber tapping tools. In the 'Migrants' series Hoy Cheong shows an interest in universal themes, like the movement of people and the strength and tenacity of the human spirit willing to risk all for a better life.

Endnote

1. Wong Hoy Cheong in The Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art [Artists' statements], Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, 1996, p.5.