John Zerunge Young is a Hong Kong-born Australian artist.
Early life
Born in Hong Kong in 1956, John Young Zerunge moved to Australia in 1967 during China's Cultural Revolution. He studied Philosophy of Science and Aesthetics at the University of Sydney, then studied sculpture and painting at Sydney College of the Arts with postmodernist artist Imants Tillers. In 1981, he left Australia on pilgrimage to Europe; whilst there, he received the Power Foundation Scholarship from the University of Sydney, enabling him to live in London and Paris. Young was instrumental in Australia's postmodern turn.
Career
Young's first solo exhibition was a one-minute show held in a hamlet in the fishing village of Rosroe, Connemara, on the west coast of Ireland. Since the mid-1980s, Young has produced three major cycles of work, the Silhouette Paintings, the Polychrome Paintings and the Double Ground Paintings, which explore the relationship between Euro-American models of culture and experience and other modes of visuality, being and the cultural object. More recently, Young has produced series of abstract paintings which deal with concerns around technology and the body: Naïve and Sentimental Paintings,The Day After Tomorrow and Spectrumfigures. Since 2008, Young’s projects have focussed on transcultural humanitarianism, culminating in the projects Bonhoeffer in Harlem, Safety Zone, and his investigations into the history of the Chinese diaspora in Australia since 1840, through projects Open Monument,1866: The Worlds of Lowe Kong Meng and Jong Ah Siug, Modernity's End and The Burrangong Affray. Young has been the subject of three survey exhibitions: Orient/Occident: John Young, 1978-2005 held at the TarraWarra Museum of Art, Victoria in 2005-2006; The Bridge and the Fruit Tree at ANU Drill Hall Gallery, Canberra in 2013, and recently The Lives of Celestials: John Young Zerunge at Town Hall Gallery, Boroondara, Melbourne in 2019. He was also critical in establishing in 1995 the Asian Australian Artists' Association, now the 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney, a centre for the promotion of Asian philanthropy and the nurturing of Australasian artists and curators. John Young is represented by ; ; ; ; ; and In the 2020 Australia Day Honours Young was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for his "significant service to the visual arts, and as a role model".
Personal life
Young currently resides in Melbourne.
Selected exhibitions
1982 The Second Mirage, Rosroe, Connemara, Ireland
1995 Antipodean Currents, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; The John F. Kennedy Centre, Washington DC, curated by Julia Robinson
1996 Systems End, Oxy Gallery, Osaka; Hakone Open Air Museum, Hakone; Dong An Gallery, Seoul; Kaoshung Museum of Art, Kaoshiung, curated by William Wright and Takeshi Kanazawa
2005-2006 Orient/Occident: John Young – a survey of works, 1978-2005, TarraWarra Museum of Art, Victoria, curated by Maudie Palmer
2009 Bonhoeffer in Harlem, Installation at St. Matthaus Church, Berlin
2013 The Bridge and the Fruit Tree: John Young - A Survey, ANU Drill Hall Gallery, Canberra
2016 The repetition of the good. The repetition of the bad, Alexander Ochs Gallery, New Synagogue, Berlin - Centrum Judaicum
2017 Macau Days, Migration Museum, Adelaide
2018 The Burrangong Affray, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney
2019 The Lives of Celestials: John Young Zerunge, Town Hall Gallery, Boroondara, Melbourne
Awards and commissions
Young has been commissioned for numerous significant national and international public projects.
2013-15 Open Monument, a permanent monument recording the contribution of the Chinese population in Ballarat, City of Ballarat, Victoria
2010-2011 Finding Kenneth Myer, Tapestry commissioned by Lady Southey and the Myer Family
2005 Open World, Tapestry commissioned by the Victorian State Government for Jiangsu Province, China to mark the occasion of the 25th anniversary of the sister city relationship between Nanjing and Melbourne
John Young, Carolyn Barnes & William Wright, John Young, Craftsman House, Thames & Hudsons, Australia, 2005
Alexander Ochs, Christhard-Georg Neubert, Kevin Rudd, Sylvia Volz, Wolfgang Huber, John Young / Bonhoeffer in Harlem, Edition St. Matthäus-Kirche Berlin, 2009
John Clark & Pamela Kember, John Young: Three Propositions, Prüss & Ochs Gallery, Berlin, 2003
Brian Castro & M.A. Greenstein, John Young: Pine's Edge, Black Inc., Melbourne, 2001
Graham Coulter-Smith, Christina Davidson & Graham Forsyth, with a foreword by Leon Parossian, John Young: Silhouettes and Polychromes, Schwartz City Publications, Melbourne, 1993
Peter Hutchings & John Clark, with foreword by Frances Lindsay and an introduction by Melissa Chiu, John Young: The Double Ground Paintings, Australian Art Promotions, Sydney, 1995
John Young & Terry Blake, 'On Some Alternatives to the Code in the Age of Hyperreality, the Hermit and the City Dweller', Art & Text #2, Winter issue, 1981
