Adrienne Wong

An artist and brand design director who draws inspiration from her travels, her Chinese heritage, and her feelings about home.

Can you introduce yourself?

I’m Adrienne. I’m an artist and graphic designer. Currently, I work as a brand design director.

What role does creativity play in your life?  

Creativity is a huge part of my life – it’s my career in design and art. Being creative – or having an outlet to be creative – is really important to me. I’m happier when I’m able to be creative, whether it’s drawing or painting at my studio space,

or designing in a work context.

I met you at your opening night of the Finding Home exhibition at Ockham Collective’s Modal precinct. Your artworks are very evocative. What inspired you to make these works? 

Most of the paintings for that show were made when I lived overseas in the US and I’d brought them to NZ. I’d been living overseas for a long, long time, and was used to moving countries, but there was this consciousness of being foreign,

always being from somewhere else and longing for New Zealand even though I was pretty happy living over there.

Part of my process is to explore my feelings and experiences in a location, which I will tap into while I’m painting so it is emotional for me. When making these paintings, I was feeling very melancholic – missing New Zealand, missing my family, and feeling like the eternal foreigner.

The video that was in the show was a little different in that I had made it once I’d returned to NZ. The video was a hybrid of images that I’d photographed in Houston and Auckland with noise that’s very Auckland – traffic, leaves rustling, and birdsong. It made me feel that now I’m ‘home’ but seeing the American images made me realise I was missing my American home as well.

We briefly spoke about a shared ‘identity crisis’, as people living outside of their home country. It’s almost like you bring your home with you everywhere you go. How do you feel about that?

I realised when I was overseas I would refer to NZ as ‘home’ and overseas as ‘home’ whenever I would visit here. Home is everywhere and nowhere at the same time – belonging yet always being an outsider. Coming back to NZ does feel different than being overseas, I feel like this is really ‘home’.

But returning has put a different angle on my work that deals with those themes – because I am Chinese and I look Chinese, I have been treated like this shouldn’t be my home. Even if my family has been here for generations. I’ve been exploring my family story and immigration in my art – something I haven’t done before.

How do you price your artworks? I always find this the most difficult part.

It is so difficult that there are workshops on how to price! I think it’s reasonable to cover the costs of the materials, and I use artists’ quality, but sometimes I can’t really price the works on the true amount of time I’ve spent on them, especially if it is weeks... it’s not like freelance design billing!

If you could change one thing in the world, what would it be?

The violence. I don’t want to say ‘world peace’, but… world peace? I would like to see the arts be a natural part of our lives, where the arts are appreciated. I’d like it to be part of the school curriculum – not as a side subject – so kids can have fun and express themselves through visual art, music, dance, and theatre. I believe it makes for a more well-rounded individual.