For the 2024 Lunar New Year — the Year of the Wood Dragon — I was commissioned by ESEA Contemporary in Manchester to create Dragon Pavilion (龍之館), an original illustration that would serve as the centrepiece of their celebration programme.
ESEA Contemporary has been platforming artists and art informed by East and Southeast Asian backgrounds since 1986, and to receive this commission felt both like a responsibility and a gift. The brief was open and generous: imagine a dragon inhabiting the gallery itself.
My starting point was conceptual. Since dragons do not exist in the physical world, they are, in a sense, already creatures of exhibitions — beings that exist only when narrated and shown. So I conceived of a Dragon Pavilion where ESEA Contemporary's own spaces and architectural features are reimagined and deconstructed: the exhibition rooms become both separate and interconnected, glimpses of installations and projections visible through the body of the dragon as it moves through the building.
The illustration was produced as a limited edition signed giclée print (edition of 20), available in green, red, and yellow, printed on acid-free matte fine art paper using platinum etching. A tote bag edition was also produced. All proceeds support ESEA Contemporary's artistic programme.