The Neon Girl

Photo: July Brunner
“Neo(n)-Antique Art” – Private commissioned work

Hi, I’m chankalun – a Hong Kong experimental neon artist based in Paris and Hong Kong. In a field still dominated by men, I aim to bring a distinct voice shaped by craft, culture, and identity.

For me, neon is more than light—it is language, memory, and living craft. My work redefines neon beyond its commercial past, transforming it into a medium for storytelling, cultural preservation, and environmental reflection.

Raised in Hong Kong, once illuminated by vibrant neon signs that shaped its urban identity, I feel both an urgency and a responsibility to revive and reinterpret this fading tradition.

An iteration of “Terre” developed at Atelier 11 (Cité Falguière) research residency and pivoted my practice into a time-based one, seeing my works as a living body.

My work merges the technical precision of neon with the expressive spontaneity of Chinese calligraphy, where language becomes form. This dialogue between media explores the contrast of “seeking perfection within imperfection“: the strict discipline of glass-bending against the fluid release of ink on paper.

For me, imperfection is not failure but evidence of life: an honest record of the body’s negotiation with material. My ongoing research expands these ideas into a study of how making becomes thinking.

“Light as Air” from the “Sustainability” Collection
Commissioned by La Prairie for Art Basel Hong Kong 2023

Since 2018, my installations have been exhibited internationally, from Art Basel Hong Kong (with UBS and La Prairie), Milan Design Week, M+ Museum, cultural institutions and events in New York, Paris, Brussels, Oxford and Pattaya.

Across the collections Invisible Natural Forces, Language, Gesture & Trace, Bodies & Identities, and Material Memory, my installations investigate how invisible systems — air, energy, memory, language, and cultural histories — become visible through light, gesture, and material transformation.

Explore Works + Collections

    Working with glass, noble gases, porcelain, stone, and reclaimed materials, she approaches making as a form of thinking: an ongoing negotiation between control and accident, fragility and endurance.

    Outtake from Kit Cheng for Vogue Singapore Artist in Residence Project

    I’m also developing a series of NFT arts and collections based on my neon works. Join our Discord community here:
    https://discord.gg/QRRDzDWFSb