Matthew Wong was one of 2020’s breakout stars at auction. Twenty-three works by the late Canadian artist were offered in sale rooms from New York to Hong Kong, raking in a whopping $24.7 million. And for good reason. His first solo show at New York’s Karma gallery in 2018 drew rave reviews, with The New York Times describing him as ‘one of the most talented painters of his generation’.

Painted mostly from his imagination, Wong’s vibrant, stylized landscapes, forest scenes and still lifes call to mind the works of Vincent van Gogh, Henri Matisse and David Hockney. But their ebullient palette frequently belies undercurrents of loneliness and what the art critic Eric Sutphin describes as a ‘melancholic yearning’. River at Dusk (2018) is no exception. Flanked by lush, luminous foliage, the river flows towards a golden sky descending into darkness — perhaps a reflection of Wong’s life-long struggles with depression.

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