Kevin T. Leong

Kevin Leong is an American-born painter currently living and working in San Francisco, California.

His work probes the question of individual reality—did the viewer really see this before looking away, and did anyone else? His paintings explore this intersection through both subject matter and paint application. The surfaces of Leong’s paintings offer a glimpse into the lifecycle of each piece, with varying weight, value, and fidelity suggesting movement across an emotional register and inviting the viewer to linger.

“Through my work, I look to confront the duality inherent in human existence. Tension informs the application—light and shadow, globs and sweeps, presence and absence. I am inspired by ceaseless change and, through painting, aim to explore how identity is constructed and deconstructed across physical and non-material planes."

Over time, each painting becomes a negotiation between opposing forces: control and chaos, intimacy and isolation, knowing and being. He works intuitively, allowing the process to evolve, pulling at both image and object. In the resulting work, he seeks to invite the viewer to confront contradiction not as conflict, but as a generative space.