Conclusion



Fanon's theories on individual shifts in identity of the migrant from a periphery to a centre are not sufficient to grasp the intentions of Wong's oeuvre. Wong's addressee is definitely the one Fanon aims to defeat rather than to speak to; Wong is more cautious by provoking this same European addressee. While Fanon points out the psychological effects of colonial violence in the conflict, Wong addresses the matter by emphasising 'otherness' and focusing on different religiously and culturally impregnated values between Christians and Muslims. I am doubtful of the way the provocative meaning in Days of Our Lives might be absorbed or rejected. I wonder about how the series will follow up as references to European genre paintings, its archives and media images and whether its editions will enter the international art market and become part of private collections and or become part of a state archive too. The latter might be more consequent and adequate for this piece of art.
The multiples Sook Ching, Re:Looking and Doghole which were developed over different periods of time for different contexts gained international recognition but seem to be particularly intended for a Malaysian audience. A reading of Fanon does not seem to contribute much for the understanding of these multiples. Parallels can be drawn between Fanon’s claims about the individual development of the colonized intellectual and the claims that Ashcroft, Griffiths and Tiffin establish in their introduction to The Empire writes back for post-colonial literatures. Whether the stages established by Fanon in the development of the intellectual and the artist coincide with stages in the corpus by Wong Hoy Cheong can not be determinate here, but might be a good topic to explore further in another study. Fanon's key-essays Black Skin, white Masks and The Wretched of the Earth only provided a very limited approach to one aspect of Wong Hoy Cheong’s work. Even when Wong Hoy Cheong in Doghole asks about the behaviour and attitude of a survivor of the colonial war towards his oppressors, the different categories of medical case studies presented by Fanon as a result of the Algerian War do not consider one attitude the interviewee in Wong Hoy Cheong's video shows: The attitude and the behaviour towards the oppressor that the artist (if not as pathologic) is considered at least a product of a psychological process that can only be understood from a colonial point of view. A more suitable approach to this theme might be reached by a closer study on Nazi concentration camp survivors and their view on modern Germany. But even that is problematic and might not lead to an explanation.[1] Wong's oeuvre also requires a deeper study of media and sociology, labour and economy to interpret the commodifying process, exploitation and the aesthetics of critique he chooses to show in the photo series Chronicles of Crime (2006), the advertising light boxes Maid in Malaysia (2008) and in his media and perspective based approaches in two channel video Suburbia: Bukit Beruntung, Subang Jaya (2006). Wong, as a contemporary artist at the height, has been working during the past decade in audiovisual media with a professional staff and even choosing public online platforms to share his work. Recently he has been involved in “promoting participatory and gender-responsive decision-making at the grassroots level.”[2]

[1]    A quote on this by Cesaire clarifies it: “[...] ce qu'il ne pardonne pas à Hitler, ce n'est pas le crime en soi, le crime contre l'homme, ce n'est que l'humiliation de l'homme en soi, c'est le crime contre l'homme blanc, et d'avoir appliqué à l'Europe des procédés colonialistes dont ne relevaient jusqu'ici que les Arabes d'Algérie, les coolies de l'Inde et les nègres d'Afrique.” Aimé Césaire, Discours sur le Colonialisme (Paris and Dakar: Présence africaine, 1989), 13-14.
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