Artist CV & Statement 

MOVING BETWEEN WORLDS

I have always existed between two aesthetic worlds without fully belonging to either. My formal art education in North America and the UK during the mid-1990s to 2000s, gave me a rigorous foundation — but it always felt slightly borrowed. The aesthetics that actually fired my imagination came from elsewhere: Japanese anime and manga, commercial graphic design, the restless visual energy of popular culture. I absorbed both, and neither cancelled the other out.

That tension is what my work is made of.  The figures in my paintings are distorted — stretched, mutated, strange things growing out of bodies that no longer conform to any recognizable whole. This is not distortion for shock alone. It is my way of pushing figurative painting into uncomfortable territory, merging a Western painterly tradition with a visual sensibility that was never quite institutional, never quite orthodox. The result unsettles people in different ways: Western viewers tend to find it disturbing in a way they’re drawn to; Asian viewers often recognise the pop cultural grammar but miss the conversation happening with painting history. Both reactions tell me something is working.

I think of this strangeness as “plasmatic” — bodies that refuse fixity, forms that resist being pinned down. There is something deeply contemporary about this refusal. We live in a time that desires mobility of identity, the freedom to not be defined by a single origin or a single appearance. My figures act that out literally on the canvas.

The distortion is also, I admit, a private joke — a mockery of my own education. The alien growths, the alienated bodies: they are my way of questioning the authority of everything I was taught to call fine art, and everything I was taught to keep separate from it.

Education
2001     MA Fine Art (Printmaking), Royal College of Art, London, UK
1998     BFA Fine Art (Painting & Printmaking), University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada

Solo Exhibitions
2017    Solo, Sense 99, Hong Kong

2017    Alienation of Desires, AM Space Gallery, Hong Kong

2011     Super(super)ficial, MODE Gallery, Singapore
2010    Make Your Face Glow, White Tube, Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong

2009   I See Myself Through Yours Eyes, Fringe Gallery, Hong Kong
2003  Six Years: 1996 to 2002, Works by Carol Ho, Red Deer & District Museum, Red Deer, Canada
1999   It is So Quiet..., The Untitled Art Society, Calgary, Canada
1999   Inside Out, The New Gallery, Calgary, Canada

Selected Group Exhibitions

2025   Skin Deep 《膚淺》, Mufei Art Space, The Pottery Workshop 樂天陶社, Hong Kong

2022   Vacant Premise, 20 Gwendrw Road, London, UK

2022   When Parallel Worlds Collide 《平行宇宙》, ArtHome 藝術家, Hong Kong
2020   Picture Palace, Transition Gallery, London, UK
2019    Narration/ Dialogue, The Muse Gallery, Hotel Stage, Hong Kong
2018    ACAVA Open Studio, London Art Fair, London, UK
2017    Sparkle! Neo Travel, Oil Street Art Space (Oi!), Hong Kong
2015    She Has a Gloomy Dream/ His Silent Disorder, Unit 502, Chai Wan, Hong Kong
2014    Chai Wan Mei Art & Design Festival, 10 Chancery Lane Gallery & Platform China, Hong Kong
2013    Mixed Exhibition No.9, The New Gallery on Old Bailey, Hong Kong
2012    Painting On and On: Part 2, Southsite & Gallery Exit, Hong Kong
2012    Urban Stimulation, Voxfire Gallery, Hong Kong
2012    Beyond the Painting Screen, New Gallery on Old Bailey, Hong Kong
2011     Imaging Images, L1 Gallery, JCCAC, Hong Kong
2010    Stretched Connotations, White Tube, Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong
2010    Back to Drawing, Hong Kong Visual Art Centre, Hong Kong
2009   The 13 Stories of Portable Art, The Pottery Workshop, Shanghai, China
2008   Anonymous Drawings N°9, Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien, Berlin, Germany
2007   Lieben Leiben, RISE Berlin, Berlin, Germany
2007   On Paper, Too Art Gallery, Hong Kong Arts Centre, Hong Kong
2005   30 x 30, Vertigo Gallery, London, UK
2004   AFTERSHOCK, 1A Space, Hong Kong
2004   FAITH, Transition Gallery, London, UK
2004   FAITH, Contemporary Art Space (CAS), Osaka, Japan
2003   Arty-Texture, Transition Gallery, London, UK
2001    The Show: One, Royal College of Art, London, UK
2000   Assembly, Stepney City, London, UK
1998    Solution - 1998 BFA Show, The Nickle Arts Museum, Calgary, Canada

Awards & Grants
2019     ADC Subsidy to visit 58th La Biennale di Venezia, Hong Kong Arts Development Council
2000    Travel Award, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, France
1999     Visual Arts Study Grant, Alberta Foundation for the Arts, Canada
1999     Independence Thought Award, University of Calgary, Department of Art, Canada

Residencies
2002    Residency Programme, London Print Studio, London, UK

Curatorial Projects
2011     Imaging Images, L1 Gallery, JCCAC, Hong Kong
2010    Back to Drawing, Hong Kong Visual Art Centre, Hong Kong
2004   FAITH, Transition Gallery, London, UK
2004   AFTERSHOCK, 1A Space, Hong Kong

Professional Experience
2025        Visiting Lecturer, painting course, Hong Kong Visual Art Centre
2018         Visiting Lecturer, BA Fine Art, Hong Kong Art School, Hong Kong
2007-12   Part-Time Lecturer (Drawing & Painting), Hong Kong Art School, Hong Kong
2015          Mentor, Julu Culture, Hong Kong
2011-12      Freelance Translator, De Sarthe Gallery, Hong Kong

Bibliography / Press
2017     Tang, Stella Ying Sze. “Carol Ho’s Feministic Paintings.” MingPao Monthly, September.
2012     "Creative Dialogue." Wen Wei Po (Hong Kong), November 20.
2012     "Today’s Focus: Painting On & On." Hong Kong Economic Journal, October 30.
2012     "The Works: Painting On & On." RTHK, Television Interview, November 27.
2010     Agnew, Mary. "Art Review: Stretched Connotations." Time Out Hong Kong, March 17.
2010     Kwok, Kevin. "Border Lines." South China Morning Post, February 2.
2003    Barr, Mary-Ann. "Artist offers valuable insight." Red Deer Advocate, January 14.

Collections
Royal College of Art, London, UK
Red Deer and District Museum, Red Deer, Canada
University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada
Works held in private collections in Hong Kong, UK, and Canada.