Owen Fu
Owen Fu (Guilin, China; lives and works in Los Angeles, USA)
Represented By Antenna Space, Shanghai & Balice Hertling, Paris & PPOW, New York
“No story doesn't mean the absence of story,
There is a story, a story about saying No.”
Owen Fu (b. 1990, Guilin, China) currently lives and works in Los Angeles. In 2018, he completed his MFA at the ArtCenter College of Design. In 2016, he received one BA in Philosophy from the Stony Brook University and the other BA in Fine Art from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago respectively.
Owen Fu’s practice is never a specific image, it is more like a hybrid being of emotions, desires and a complicated incarnation of realities that beneath the superficial ordinary life. Behind the image is a void without a face, layered ink tones spread, in which sensual sentiments, emptiness, joy and sorrow drift around.
Owen’s works are part of the permanent collections of institutions worldwide, including Sunpride Foundation, Hong Kong; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles, US; the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, US; the Domus Collection, New York, US; the K11 Art Foundation, Hong Kong, China; the START Museum, Shanghai, China; the George Economou Collection, Athens, Greece; the Aïshti Foundation, Beirut, Lebanon; and the Juan and Patricia Vergez Collection, Buenos Aires, Argentina, and among others.
I used to think I was painting loneliness.
Maybe I wasn’t.
Maybe I was always painting connection.
A plug is always looking for a socket.
Only then does the light appear.
The wires disappeared.
The figures disappeared.
But the hole stayed.
People call it an eye.
I don’t.
It’s a place waiting for something to connect.
Maybe loneliness isn’t the subject.
Maybe it’s only what remains when nothing ever quite reaches the other side.
SOLO
2025
Own Alone, P·P·O·W, New York, NY, USA
Wang Lai (独于天地往来), Antenna Space, Shanghai, China
2023
Last Summer, Balice Hertling, Paris, France
2022
Ordinary Things, O-Town House, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Stealing Beauty, Antenna Space, Shanghai, China
2021
After Hours, Balice Hertling, Paris, France
2020
6 self-portraits and one lamp, Gallery Platform LA
Bubbly Hills, Mine Project, Hong Kong, China
Small Talk, O-Town House, Los Angeles, CA, USA
2018
No Story, Art Center Main Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Body Obsession, Art Center PPR, Pasadena, CA, USA
2016
Emoji Expression, New York Art Expo, New York, NY, USA
GROUP (Selected)
2025
Surface Streets Curated by Russell Ferguson, Marian Goodman Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, USA
2024
Dance This Mess Around Curated By Richard Hull, Patient Info, Chicago, IL, USA
2023
Palai Project, Balice Hertling, Lecce, Italy
Together in Time, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Beijing Biennial: Magic Square Art and Literature in Mirror Image, Curator BoLiang Shen, Beijing, China
Uncanny Valley, Curator Yang Zi, Gagosian, Hong Kong, China
2022
Space, Laurel Gitlen, New York, NY, USA
Inner Dims, Sifang Art Museum, Shanghai, China
Trace Image, Deborah Schamoni, Munich, Germany
Exposition N°120 (maybe), Balice Hertling, Paris, France
2021
The Going Away Present For Bruce Hainley, Kristina Kite Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Organized by Kristina Kite and Sarah Lehrer-Graiwer
Palai Project, Balice Hertling, Lecce, Italy
Who's Afraid of the Great Indoors, Redling Fine Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Pathologically Social, organized with Mark Verabioff, O-Town House, Los Angeles, CA, USA
2020
Winterfest, curated by Saim Demircan, Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO, USA
Gennariello (part II), curated by Daniele Balice, Balice Hertling, Paris, France
About FACE: Cover Me, Curator Ali Subotnick, Gallery Platform LA
David Zwirner Platform: Los Angeles
2019
Condo Complex: Lomex Gallery hosting O-town House, New York
2018
Just Edging 2, Art Center college of Design, Pasadena, CA, USA
2016
Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL, USA