Jimmy Ong, one of Singapore’s leading contemporary artists, comes home with a new exhibition at Valentine Willie Fine Art, showing his latest series of works in his first major solo exhibition in Singapore in 11 years.

Presented by Valentine Willie Fine Art Singapore and titled Ancestors on the Beach, the show comprises of 15 characteristically monumental charcoal drawings on paper, executed between 2003 and 2007.

Ong, who currently lives in Vermont, USA, continues his explorations of the human condition and human relationships, visualised through iconic, unconventional and provocative compositions of two or three large figures. Each work has a height of over 2 metres.

Ancestors on the Beach concerns the artist’s coming to terms with his past, by presenting his visual ‘wish list’. The 15 variations of figures convey his attitudes about ‘families’ and a hope to see the day when differences — whether based on religion, race, gender or sexual orientation — can be celebrated and respected.

Through his bold, calligraphic and gestural depictions of the human figure, and an artistic process that throws in influences ranging from pop culture to Buddhism, Ong rehabilitates not only personal ghosts of the past, but also the ostracised and marginalised.

As a Singaporean who has lived away for 13 years, Jimmy Ong is looking in from the outside on topical issues such as national identity, citizenship, sexual minorities and their politics. On the fundamental message of the show, Jimmy Ong has this simple statement:

“Everyone has the same potential and capacity to love, create a family and be happy.”

Jimmy Ong’s works remain highly sought after, and he is one of the few artists of his generation commanding high prices in the Singapore and Hong Kong auction markets. In October 2005, a monumental landscape, Nelli’s Dream, sold at Sotheby’s Singapore for $45,600. Presently his works can be found in the collections of the Singapore Art Museum, NUS Museum, Deutsche Bank Singapore, Fullerton Hotel, Fraser Suites.