Kevin Chin: Len Fox Prize Finalist

Kevin Chin is a finalist in the Len Fox Prize at Castlemaine Art Museum for his work Sneaky Guest, 2022.

"My paintings assemble cultural references from across continents, furthering EP Fox’s investigation into how Australia fits in with the rest of the world. Sneaky Guest explores how Australians piece together postcolonial identities, navigate global flows, and negotiate our connection with the land.

Here I use the fox as a vestige of British colonisation - equally our storybook friend, yet pest to native wildlife. The fox is depicted as wanderer, sighted across metropolitan, regional, and rural Australia. This slippery relationship to place is heightened by the suburban house and mixed-up landscape, which trace multiple histories to varied narratives.

As a person of colour who migrated from one colonised country to another as an infant, I express the perspective of minority groups that the art institution has objectified and excluded. I use the scale and language of grandiose historical painting, but filtered through diverse influences, to reclaim contemporary art on behalf of the marginalised." Kevin Chin

(image: Sneaky Guest, 2022 (DETAIL)