Born 1992 in Nanping, China. Lives in New York City and Singapore.

(he/him/his)

Damien Ding’s paintings are about the struggle often experienced in one’s attempts to articulate emotions and to possibly provide a source through which these emotions can be felt. His attempts trapeze around the gaps in half-remembered experiences and the nearness of ideas typically seen as diametrically opposed and separate. Most immediately, these gaps and anti-dualistic ideas manifest in experiences of devotion, fetish, and intimacy. To facilitate this intimate engagement with painting that is central to his practice, he utilizes the material and language of furniture and cabinetry as containers and spaces for his images, reminiscent of domestic altars, and small chapels. He believes the particular situations he places his paintings in give rise to the oxymoronic, illogical, and surreptitious, elements that catalyze the generation of strong feelings. In these zoomed-in, sometimes quiet, sometimes violent, experiences that he depicts hide the possibly expansive and transcendent. Within such constructed contexts, perhaps what “is” can more easily emerge. Yet, he believes what is eventually revealed can often only be felt, and remains difficult to enunciate in text.

Damien Ding holds a BA in Art History with a minor in Asian Studies from Swarthmore College and an MFA in Painting and Printmaking from the Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts. He has had solo exhibitions at List Gallery, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, The Anderson Gallery, Richmond, VA, and group exhibitions at Spazio Amanita in New York and Fox Garden in Richmond Virginia.