The artist received a BFA from the Ruskin School of Art at the University of Oxford in 2016 and an MA at the Royal College of Art in 2018 supported by the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation. Alvin Ong, Insomaniacs, 2018, 41 x 52 cmīorn in Singapore in 1988, Alvin Ong lives and works sharing his time between Singapore and London. Moreover, deformed and irritated facial expressions are emphasised completing the painting framework with grotesque sensations. Bare hands and legs in summery also create an additional recurrent motif in his work. Clumsy gestures with pointed fingers in uncomfortable positions present an ongoing abnormal body language. Loads of hand movements, freely and illogically choreographed, seem to rule Ong’s canvases gradually developing an over-elaborate environment. The voluptuous body forms do not rest on the overweight and inflexible external appearances, but invest on constructing substantial stories, which successfully fulfill the eye as well as the mind. The underlined lack of conventional limits leads the painting outcome into imaginative stories of affluence and hedonism.
Thus, expressions of agony and torture are thoroughly captured on the characters’ swollen faces. Given this environment of fight, this revengefully awkward depiction is centered on the surface establishing it as one of the most aggressive and energetic Ong recently executed. Characteristically, Insomaniacs’ highlight is the hand of one character fisting the other’s mouth, while the latter one’s forefinger menacingly moves towards the other figure’s eye. Paintings, such as Insomaniacs, 2018, or Monsoon Pop, 2018, illustrate a brutal portrayal of intermingled bodies tangled into gauche and uncoordinated positions. The painting style can be dramatic, yet its outcome is not overworked. Although the viewer deals with remarkably detailed scenes, the Ong leaves his fantasy to form spontaneous creations where the characters are being slowly developed on the surface of his canvas. This involves a lot of looking, and allowing the image to come into its own, in its own time”.
The artist notes himself that he tries “to keep a light touch, and I try not to make them overworked. Ong seems to make paintings that challenge gender fluidity within his surreal compositions manipulating the gaze with aesthetic details that uplifts the general depiction. Alvin Ong, Yavuz gallery, solo show, installation view, 2019 While viewing Ong’s work, these body formations play a major role in the provocative portrayal of extravagant visualisations and immoderate narratives. Uncanny bodily silhouettes, mainly rendered in chubby and flabby shapes, evidently dominate his work suggesting the presence of excessiveness. Furthermore, the depictions reveal an artistic coherence beholding common-based features: dynamic movement, vivid colours and grotesque scenes. The colour palette is concentrated on specific hues, such as yellow, black, white and dark blue. At the same time, abstraction is surrounding his work blurring the painting lines, disorientating the eye and confusing the perspectives of clarity. Sticking with figurative forms, Ong mainly concentrates his approach on human curvaceous figures that comfortably flow on his canvases. Actually, the young artist examines simultaneously the creative comparison between these two expressions of representation. 1988) succulently explores the methodological structure of vision encompassing figurative as well as abstract features on his canvases.
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