ARTIST'S TALK AND EXHIBITION | CAROL M. BOWEN | MEETING VINCENT

Name: ARTIST'S TALK AND EXHIBITION | CAROL M. BOWEN | MEETING VINCENT
Start: 2026-04-25T19:00:00+08:00
End: 2026-04-25T20:30:00+08:00
Location: Hikayat

Schedule

Sat Apr 25 2026 at 07:00 pm to 08:30 pm

UTC+08:00

Location

Hikayat | George Town, PG

We hope this finds you well. We are delighted to invite you to our new exhibition – Meeting Vincent by Carol M. Bowen.
Here are the details for your diary.
Opening and Artist’s Talk: Saturday 25 April 2026, 7.00pm
Your chance to see the artworks and meet the artist. Carol will be in conversation with Gareth.
Free admission
Refreshments will be served
The exhibition will then run until Sunday 31 May 2026
Venue: Hikayat, 226 Lebuh Pantai, 10300 George Town, Penang
➽ The exhibition | Artist’s statement
My practice is a dialogue between two centuries, two continents and two states of being. It is rooted in ‘inherited sight’ – the belief that an artist never sees in a vacuum, but rather through a map of visual languages passed down by those who came before.
In the final months of his life in Auvers-sur-Oise, Vincent van Gogh painted with a desperate, breathtaking velocity – a pace I chose to inhabit for sixty days here in Penang. However, where Vincent found the encroaching shadows of the wheat fields, I have found an exuberant, modern vitality. This collection of paintings, Meeting Vincent, is not a study of sorrow, but a record of a joyful collision between a Post-Impressionist sensibility and the saturated brilliance of Southeast Asia.
My daily practice became an act of observational devotion. I found myself chasing the vibration of colour that defines life in the tropics: the electric saffron of a monk’s robe catching the morning sun, the intricate, rhythmic patterns of sarees glimpsed in a crowded market, and the neon pinks and deep vermilions of temple offerings. These are not merely decorative hues; they are the pulse of a culture that lives out loud.
The light in Penang acts as a transformative lens. It bounces off the Andaman Sea, turning the water into a sheet of brilliant cerulean that demands a bolder palette and a more decisive brushstroke. By filtering the lush tropical flora and the architectural rhythms of George Town through a van Gogh-like intensity, I sought to capture the heat, the humidity and the sheer optical noise of this landscape.
Meeting Vincent is an invitation to see the familiar through a lens of heightened celebration. It is a testament to the power of light to dissolve gloom, and a gratitude journal painted in the vivid, unapologetic visual frequency where colour and light vibrate with the urgency of the present moment. It is my testimony of visibility.

➽ The Artist | Carol M. Bowen
Carol M. Bowen is a multidisciplinary painter, educator and digital communicator whose practice explores the intersection of art history, technical mastery and personal narrative. Her career is defined by a deep commitment to the physical language of materials – a journey that began in New Orleans as an ‘in-painter’ restoring nineteenth-century oil paintings at the Phyllis Hudson Studio. This early immersion in the physical restoration of historical works laid the foundation for her lifelong fascination with the syntax of the brush and the structural integrity of the mark.
Carol’s academic and professional pedigree is extensive, with a Master of Fine Arts from Tulane University and a Master of Art Education from Rhode Island College. She served as the chair of the Visual Arts Department, the Dalton School, New York City. She has also held faculty positions at the Rhode Island School of Design, Massachusetts College of Art, City College of New York and Tulane University.
Beyond the classroom, Carol is a dedicated advocate for art as a tool for public engagement. She has led programmes at the American Museum of Natural History, the Fuller Art Museum, the Staten Island Children’s Museum and the Darien Nature Center. On her YouTube channel, she documents global traditions of craft, taking viewers from the historic mosaic furnaces of Italy to the public art installations of New York City, demystifying complex technical processes for a global audience.
Carol’s own work has been exhibited at notable New York venues including EXIT Art and Tribeca 148 Gallery, and her public art footprint includes large-scale mosaic installations for the City of New Rochelle, New York, and the Dalton School. A dedicated researcher of place, she was the 2025 Annual Artist in Residence at the Borneo Art Lab in Kuching, a vital precursor to her current work in George Town.
The artworks from the exhibition will be on sale.