Born in Penang in 1960, Wong Hoy Cheong graduated with a degree in Literature and Fine Arts from Brandeis University, Massachusetts in 1982. He obtained a Masters in Education from Harvard University, in 1984, and his Masters in Fine Arts (Painting) from University of Massachusetts, in 1986. His art speaks directly to the human right issues that confront us: social conditions, poverty and exploitation.Wong's Ranjau Sepangjang Jalan is titled after a novel by Malaysian novelist, satirist and short story writer, Shahnon Ahmad. Written in 1966, Ahmad's novel, translated in English as No Harvest but a Thorn, centres around the worldview and the livelihood of Malay peasantry. Adapted for the stage and made mandatory reading in Malaysian public schools, it sealed his reputation as a critical observer of society. Hoy Cheong's interpretative work stands in a long line of engagement with the novel. A centre panel depicts a gathering of Malay womenfolk. A heightened expressiveness runs through the painterly quality of the work, with the use of energetic, symbolic colours, and the almost formulaic compositional arrangement of the figures and the elaborative design of their garments. On two other panels that flank this one, Hoy Cheong has painted two imposing larger-than-life figures, each one captured in a vigorously stylised pose, as if actors straight out of the stage or the pages of a novel. The dramatic contrast of figures and scenes among the three panels is unsettling and a crucial aspect of the work's narrative.
