Hung Liu 劉虹 (b. 1948)

Born in Changchun, China and now an American citizen, Hung Liu holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art and Art Education from the Beijing Teacher’s College, a Graduate Degree in Mural Painting from the Central Academy of Fine Art, Beijing, and a Master of Fine Arts Degree in Visual Arts from the University of California San Diego. Today, she is Professor of Arts at MillsCollege in Oakland.

Over the years, Liu has staged more than 50 solo exhibitions and over 100 group exhibitions in the U.S, China and numerous other parts of Asia and Europe. She has also been the recipient of several prestigious awards like the Society for the Encouragement of Contemporary Art (SECA) Award, and the San Francisco Women’s Center Humanities Award, to name a few. Her artworks are on permanent display at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, and various corporate institutions in the U.S.

Hung Liu’s art conveys her intimate interpretations of various cultural and societal issues, drawing inspiration from turn-of-the-century photographs which she collects from China. These rare and unique remnants of an episodic time and the stories encased within them are artistically projected into meaningful oil and canvas paintings, thus encapsulating Liu’s personal impressions and reflections.

Liu’s protagonists usually centre on nameless female figures, individuals who were sold off into prostitution; with lotuses symbolising offerings surrounding their lithe, porcelain bodies. Through her paintings, she desires to bestow them ‘new lives’, being a believer in the notion that art needs ‘soul’ and ‘meaning’ to acquire timelessness. These paintings by Liu are analogous to shrines that have been dedicated to these lost women.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

Summoning Ghosts: The Art of Hung Liu Retrospective, 2015, Palm Springs Art Museum, California, USA
Hung Liu: Prints and Tapestries, 2014, La Salle University Art Museum, Philadelphia, PA, USA
Summoning Ghosts: The Art of Hung Liu Retrospective, 2015, Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, USA
The Rat Years, 2014, Huntington Museum of Art, Huntington, West Virginia, USA
Questions from the Sky: New Work from Hung Liu, 2013, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA, USA
Summoning Ghosts: The Art of Hung Liu Retrospective, 2013, Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA, USA
Hung Liu: Offerings, 2013, Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, CA, USA

Selected Group Exhibitions

I’ll Show you Mine: Contemporary Artists Explore Family Portraits, 2014, Palo Alto, CA, USA
Beautiful Disintegrating Obstinate Horror Drawing and Other Recent Acquisitions and Selections from the Museums’ Permanent Collection, 2014, UNM Art Museum’s Jonson Gallery, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA
The Intuitionists, 2014, The Drawing Center, New York, USA
Radical Repetition: Albers to Warhol, from the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and his Family Foundation, 2014, Whatcom Museum, Bellingham, WA, USA
The Female Gaze: Selfhood and Community from the Linda Lee Alter Collection of Art by Women, 2014, Victoria H. Myhren Gallery, University of Denver School of Art and Art History
The Other Side: Chinese and Mexican Immigration to America, 2014, USC Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, CA, USA
Hung Liu: Old Road: West Wind, 2007, iPreciation, Singapore

For the full list of exhibitions, please contact the gallery at enquiry@ipreciation.com

Public Collections

2016 – Highland Hospital, Oakland, California, USA
2008 – San Francisco International Airport, California, USA
2006 – Oakland International Airport Terminal 2, California, USA
2004 – Asian Art Museum Civic Centre, San Francisco, California, USA
2002 – Cerritos Library, California, USA
1995 – Embarcadero Center, San Francisco, California, USA
1995 – San Jose Museum of Art and the City of San Jose Collection, California, USA
1992 – Moscone Convention Center, San Francisco California
1986 – Media Center and Communications Building, University of California, San Diego, USA
1981 – Central Academy of Fine Art, Beijing, China

For full list of public collections, please contact the gallery at enquiry@ipreciation.com

Images of artworks