Wen Wu turns the gaze of her ancient Greek male homosexual alter ego onto emo boys for her First Step exhibition at Chinese Arts Centre.

Wen Wu is a London based painter who grew up and was educated in Qing Dao, China. Wu is interested in beauty and the constructs of beauty. Her previous works have drawn influence from the western depictions of beauty in magazines of the 40s and 50s which were available to Wu during her time at university.

Inspired by the late nineteenth century portraits of Bosie (Lord Alfred Douglas), Oscar Wilde’s gay lover, Wu has developed from exploring the feminine ideal to portrayals of beautiful young men. Her latest work employs the gaze of an alter ego developed from the historically accurate yet taboo breaking Greek myth of Ganymede. Ganymede is interpreted to have been the male lover of Zeus and depictions from ancient times through to the Baroque have shown Ganymede to be a beautiful young man raptured by an eagle (Zeus). From this unique perspective Wen creates oil paintings which convey a fascination with the beauty of young men.

The First Step exhibition features a new series Emo Boys developed during her Whisper residency at Chinese Arts Centre in September 2008. These new works turn the gaze of her ancient Greek homosexual male alter ego onto the style and personalities of contemporary emo boys, characterised by their hairstyles, fashion and music tastes.

Wen Wu was born in Qingdao, China in 1978. She graduated in 2001 with a Fine Art degree from Qinghua University, Beijing. She moved to London in 2004 and achieved a MA in Fine Art in 2005 at the London Metropolitan University.