December 19, 2024 (Palo Alto, CA) – Qualia Contemporary Art is pleased to announce Nick Dong: Auspicious, an immersive solo exhibition of 13 works by the Oakland-based artist. Dong’s technologically engaged work reflects his Taiwanese-American identity and Tibetan Buddhist upbringing, referencing spirituality and heritage through a distinctly contemporary lens. At the exhibition’s core are the first 11 works of an ongoing series of 88 works entitled “Auspicious 88”, which is set to be complete by 2028. Two separate series of pencil and ballpoint pen drawings on acrylic will complement this monumental project in the gallery. Nick Dong: Auspicious will be open to the public from January 11, 2025, to March 1, 2025, with an opening celebration hosted on Saturday, January 11, from 4:30-6:30 PM PST. For more information, please visit www.qualiagallery.com.
The primary focus of the exhibition, “Auspicious 88” takes as its inspiration the number eight and its auspicious nature in Buddhist teachings. Its significance is represented in the Eight Auspicious Symbols (ashtamangala), a set of visual symbols that are prevalent throughout Tibetan religious art and also appear in other religious traditions outside of Buddhism, such as Hinduism and Jainism. Dong reinterprets these classic eight symbols—the Precious Parasol, White Conch Shell, Two Golden Fishes, Eternity Knot, Treasure Vase, Victory Banner, Lotus Flower, and the Dharma Wheel—in service of his own auspicious creation. While much of the artist’s earlier work took a tongue-in-cheek approach, portraying the commodification, Westernization, and simplification of key Buddhist concepts like “enlightenment” with an ironic tone, Dong has since come to realize the powerful effect his work has on viewers from all backgrounds, even when conceived in jest.
The complex technological components of Dong’s work are immediately apparent in his installation and sculptural work, but the inner workings of each piece are expertly concealed so as to highlight their mystique. Beguiling viewers with their multimedia facets, moving parts, and audio-visual elements, the “Auspicious 88” works are the artist’s own form of phantasmagoria. The spiritual connotation of the series is underscored by its immersive, multisensory nature. Qualia Contemporary Art is delighted to put Dong’s artistic practice in dialogue with the tech community in Silicon Valley, showing how the intersection of art and technology is at the cutting edge of contemporary creation and discourse. The gallery looks forward to introducing visitors and the Palo Alto community to Nick Dong’s multidimensional works.
About Nick Dong
Nick Dong 董承濂 (b. 1973, Taiwan; based in Oakland and Taipei) is a multidisciplinary artist whose experiential mixed-media sculptures, wearable objects, and installations combine an advanced knowledge of materials and technique with a gift for elevating an audience’s experience beyond the optical. By seamlessly integrating sophisticated engineering and metalsmithing components, supernatural movements, light, sound, and various interactive or situational strategies, Dong’s practice creates a fully immersive event, only complete once a participant’s encounter is initiated.
Since the early 1990s his work has been shown extensively in galleries in Taiwan and throughout the United States. In 2003, Dong’s work was included in the Cheongju International Craft Biennial in Cheongju City, Korea; in 2008, he was one of twenty metal artists from thirteen countries selected for Artitude 2008 at Kunstbanken Museum in Hamar, Norway. In 2012, Dong was included in 40 Under 40: Craft Futures, at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington D.C. In 2016 he exhibited his large-scale mixed-media work Patterns from Heaven and Earth at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. His work was the subject of the solo show Specular Reflection at the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in 2017. In 2021 his solo exhibition Divine Immersion opened at the USC Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena, CA, and the same year he participated in the exhibition GLOW in Exploratorium Museum in San Francisco, CA. Dong holds a BFA in Mixed Media and Painting from Tung-Hai University in Taichung, Taiwan and an MFA in Metalsmithing in Jewelry from the University of Oregon.
His works are in the permanent collections of KUNSTBANKEN Museum, Hamar, Norway; Asia Modern Museum, Taichung, Taiwan; White Rabbit Gallery, Sydney, Australia.
About Qualia Contemporary Art
Located in downtown Palo Alto, the heart of Silicon Valley, Qualia Contemporary Art is dedicated to showcasing outstanding established and emerging artists working in a variety of media. The gallery is committed to building lasting relationships with artists, collectors, curators, and scholars nationally and internationally, and providing a vital platform for dialogues on contemporary art and culture in the Bay Area and beyond.
Location
229 Hamilton Ave
Palo Alto, CA 94301
Gallery Contact
Dacia Xu
650-656-9132
Media Contact
Lainya Magaña, A&O PR
347-395-4155
Check gallery website for hours and additional info
