As the art world converges on Hong Kong for the first Asian edition of Art Basel, Art Radar picks out the best of the international press coverage for you every day. Catch up on the latest news, interviews, blogs, reviews, videos, and podcasts all right here.

Zhen Chen, ‘Le Rite Suspendue/Mouille’, 1991, metal, Plexiglas, water, earth, sand, pigment, paint,
found objects, 280 X 800 X 700 cm. Image courtesy de Sarthe Gallery. 

Ripple effect of record sales in New York - The Art Newspaper – 22 May 2013 - What impact could last week’s record-breaking Christies auction have on Art Basel Hong Kong?

Andy Warhol and Dollar Signs. Dominique Levy Gallery at Art Basel Hong Kong - Yareah - 22 May 2013 – Dominique Lévy Gallery exhibits selected artworks by Andy Warhol at Art Basel Hong Kong.

A fair to remember: why Sydney galleries head to New York and Hong Kong to sell their art - Newcastle Herald - 22 May 2013 - Australian gallerists consider Hong Kong as a their major art hub.

All eyes on Hong Kong as Art Basel hits city, bringing tourism boost with it – South China Morning Post – 22 May 2013 – The article explores Art Basel Hong Kong as a merger of culture and of capital.

Chapman brothers unveil diabolical art in Hong Kong - AFP - 22 May 2013 - On Chapman brothers’ first exhibition in China at Art Basel Hong Kong.

Is Hong Kong ready for contemporary art? – Time Out Hong Kong – 21 May 2013 – Taking stock of the conflicting notions on art in Hong Kong, with the city geared up for Art Basel.

BLOG Where to Find Hong Kong Art During Art Basel – The Wall Street Journal – 21 May 2013 – A guide to what to see and where to see it at Art Basel Hong Kong.

VIDEO Zhao Zhao’s Gunshots for Art Basel Hong Kong – Blouin Artinfo – 20 May 2013 – Artist Zhao Zhao talks about his work at Art Basel Hong Kong and how he’s trying to avoid trouble.

Art Basel to bring international flair to Hong Kong – Channel News Asia – 19 May 2013 – Director Magnus Renfrew talks about the global significance of the first edition of Art Basel Hong Kong.

BLOG A New Art Basel for Asia – The Wall Street Journal – 17 May 2013 – Art Basel Hong Kong will be an edge above – in sales, visitors, wealthy collectors and top notch galleries.

Top 5 Art Talks during Art Basel Hong Kong - Blouin Art Info - 17 May 2013 - A list of the top five art talks during Art Basel Hong Kong.

RADIO Compendium of Malaysian Art (COMA) @ Art Basel HK – BFM -17 May 2013 - Gallerist Lim Wei-Ling and visual artist Ivan Lam talk about what it took to be the only Malaysian gallery to be selected for Art Basel Hong Kong.

Beyond the samosas – Financial Times – 17 May 2013 – Is national identity still relevant to art, artists and collectors?

East, west and points in between - Financial Times – 17 May 2013 - Curator Yuko Hasegawa discusses the shifting geopolitical and cultural landscape and what this means for the art world.

Hong Kong art explosion: What to see this month – CNN Travel – 17 May 2013 – A guide to the key art fairs and exhibitions in Hong Kong in May.

Liam Gillick, ‘Complete Bin Development’, 2013, 300 x 150 x 150 cm, powder-coated aluminum and Plexiglas. Image courtesy Art Basel Hong Kong.

A New Art Basel for Asia – The Wall Street Journal – 16 May 2013 – An overview of the development of Art Basel brand and a review what’s in store at this year’s Hong Kong edition.

Art Basel’s Hong Kong opening signals shift toward Asia – China Daily - 15 May 2013 – On the importance of art fairs and Asia’s growing recognition in international art.

Art Basel Debuts In Hong Kong – Forbes – 13 May 2013 – An article listing the basic essentials a smooth trip to Art Basel Hong Kong, from what art to buy to which hotels to book.

VIDEO Wang Yuyang Prepares for Art Basel Hong Kong – Blouin Artinfo - 12 May 2013 – Artist Wang Yuyang gives viewers a peek into his creative process and his studio, as he speaks about his art.

 JP/CN/KN

Click here to read our coverage of Art Basel Hong Kong 2013

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Yekaterinburg street artist Timofey Radya took the top honour at the first New York edition of the Cutlog Art Fair, held 9 to 13 May 2013, with a pyramid sculpted from forty police riot shields symbolising the fragility of power.

Timofey Radya, ‘Figure #1: Stability’, 2013, police riot shields. Image courtesy Timofey Radya.

Timofey Radya, a philosophy student before he turned to street art, won Cutlog NY‘s Artist Prize for Figure #1: Stability, a large-scale urban installation modelled on a 2012 work. Russia Beyond the Headlines claims that the sculpture is Radya’s vision of the current Russian government, which is “based on force but able to be brought crashing down like a house of cards”.

Following the announcement of Radya’s win, Cutlog founder Bruno Hadjadj did not focus on Figure #1: Stability‘s political themes, stating in a press release,

The Cutlog NY prize is an expansion of Cutlog Paris’s ARTE prize, and was originated to support a rising art star for his or her outstanding work at the fair.

Timofey Radya, ‘Figure #1: Stability’, 2013, police riot shields. Image courtesy Timofey Radya.

Street art Stability, political fragility 

Radya recreated Figure #1 Stability outside New York’s Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural Center for the Cutlog fair. The original, Stability, was made out of 55 police riot shields stacked in the shape of a house of cards topped with a mock golden throne, and was constructed in December 2012 in a forest outside Yekaterinburg. The structure took hours to assemble and fell down in minutes, a process which Radya and his street art group captured on video.

Watch Timofey Radya and his street art group build the original Stability in 2012 below.

The urban intervention was both a celebration and a critique of the one-year anniversary of the political protest movement which followed Russia’s 2011 parliamentary elections, says Hyperallergic.

Speaking to the Calvert Journal, Radya discussed what led him to create Stability, 

I remember after I saw the protesters clash with the police on Bolotnaya Square in December 2012 [...] I really didn’t like it at all [...] That was a good example of a problem that cannot be solved with force. That using force is just a postponement of an actual necessary solution. That it’s just building a house of cards, which despite the strength of the materials has a very questionable stability.

Portraits, graffiti and Molotov cocktails

Much of Radya’s work takes the form of installations and urban interventions similar to that of Figure #1: Stability, points out Hyperallergic. After capturing the attention of the Russian media in 2008 with his collage graffiti work After the War, Radya’s “Eternal Fire” series (2011), graffiti portraits of military figures made using Molotov cocktails, garnered coverage from the UK media.

Timofey Radya, ‘Eternal Flame’, 2011. Image courtesy Timofey Radya.

It was Russia’s controversial 2011 election period which brought more politics into Radya’s urban interventions, claims the Calvert Journal. “You were Cheated“ was a series of large-scale billboards erected by Radya and his team around Yekaterinburg in the wake of the reportedly rigged vote. “There are a huge number of viewers on the street,” the artist told the Calvert Journal in a 2013 interview. “I try to work for them.”

In February 2013, Radya was also nominated for the Innovation State Award for Contemporary Art, given annually by the National Centre for Contemporary Arts. Previous winners of the Innovation State Award include Voina, the controversial performance art group which preceded jailed art protesters Pussy Riot. Despite his sometimes critical stance, Radya has avoided problems with the Russian state: he is currently resident at Yekaterinburg’s National Centre for Contemporary Art (NCCA) and has held exhibitions at art spaces such as Winzavod in Moscow (2011).

Cutlog Art Fair New York 

Timofey Radya is the first recipient of cutlog NY’s Artist Prize. Originally based in France, this was the first ever North American edition of Cutlog, which billed itself as a “creative laboratory” for international contemporary artists. The fair, which coincided with Frieze New York, saw 45 galleries and curators present a selection of exhibitions, installations, performances and films.

CN/KN/HH

Related Topics: Russian artists, street art, art prizes, political art

Related Posts:

• FX Harsono and the art of political protest – Para Site Hong Kong artist talk – April 2013 – Indonesian performance artist speaks truth to power
• Art upfront: 5 best public art stories – December 2012 – click back through the top public art posts from the Art Radar archive
• Young Russian contemporary artists on art as communication – video – November 2011 – eight emerging artists reveal how they connect through art
• What is street art? Vandalism, graffiti or public art? – Part 1 – January 2010 – contemporary art’s controversial sibling explained
• Picasso of China or voice of dissent? Who is Ai Weiwei? Profile – September 2009 – Ai divides opinion through his art and activism

Subscribe to Art Radar for more on Russian contemporary artists

The inaugural Art Basel Hong Kong is just days away, and you may be wondering how to make the most of the four short days that you have been given to tackle the biggest art fair in Asia. Well, wonder no more! In a video interview with Wall Street Journal, Art Radar founder Kate Cary Evans reveals four useful tips.

Artwork by Chow Chun Fai (‘Infernal Affairs, “I want my identity back”’, 2007, enamel paint on canvas), just one of the many artists and art professionals who will be speaking as part of Art Basel Hong Kong 2013′s Talks programme.

Kate Cary Evan’s top tips for art fair visitors,

1. “At art fairs, you get to meet dealers in person. When you go to galleries, you are more likely to be greeted by interns.”
2. “Go on a weekday, not a weekend…” and “go to panels and talks”.
3. “Reserve a work at the beginning and then negotiate before the end of the fair.”
4. “Enjoy yourself.”

Click here to read the full article, titled “Art Basel Hong Kong: What to Know Before You Go”, on the Wall Street Journal website (subscriber access only).

Kate Cary Evans also spoke with correspondent Wei Gu about Chinese contemporary art, and why now is a good time to collect it, in a video interview published online by the newspaper on 16 May 2013. Watch the interview below or on the WSJ website.

KN/HH

Related Topics: art fairs in Asia, contemporary Chinese artists, business of art – art investment, market watch – recession

Related Posts:

• China sales slump, USA back on top in global art market - March 2013 - an end to the two year growth spurt that took China to the top
• ART HK becomes Art Basel Hong Kong but retains Asia focus - January 2013 - line up and outlook for the 2013 edition of the fair
• 13 Asia-based art collectors crack 2012 ARTnews global top 200 - July 2012 – An indicator that the Asian region still has a lot of potential for art market growth?
  
• Rich swap stocks for art: Investment, passion or a bit of both? - February 2012 - What is driving this trend and is it sustainable, or even true?
• Western art advisors turn to Asian new media art for their corporate clients – International Herald Tribune - September 2008 – demand for contemporary Chinese art “will not cool”, but the trend will “change a bit”

Click here to read our coverage of Art Basel Hong Kong 2013

Subscribe to Art Radar for more on contemporary art fairs in Asia

In 2011, Art Basel bought a sixty percent share in homegrown art fair ART HK, which had, since being founded in 2007, grown to become the biggest fair of its kind in the Asia region. Head into our archives to take a look at our coverage of past editions of this local fair and its transformation under the Art Basel banner.

2013

January

• ART HK becomes Art Basel Hong Kong but retains Asia focus

2012

June

• Art Basel in Hong Kong announces plans for 2013 art fair – press release
  

May

• Hong Kong art fair ART HK 12: Final day sales figures
• Hong Kong art fair ART HK 12: Art practice and the camera lens – 3 artists discuss at Asia Art Archive
• ART HK 12: Sales figures days 1 and 2
• ART HK 12: Redefining the space we live in – Asia Art Archive Open Platform speakers
• ART HK 12: Hong Kong artist Lee Kit wins ART FUTURES prize
• ART HK 12: First time Asian galleries talk art fair strategy
• ART HK 12: Rolling media round-up [UPDATED 1 June 2012]
• Pearl Lam: Another gallery for Hong Kong’s Pedder Building

Awarding the ART FUTURES prize. From left to right: Roberto Ceresia, AIKE-DELLARCO, Lars Nittve, Executive Director, M+, Lee Kit, Magnus Renfrew, Fair Director, ART HK, Elaine Ng, Editor and Publisher, ArtAsiaPacific Magazine, Okwui Enwezor, Curator. Image Courtesy ART HK.

April

• Tokyo-based Yuko Hasegawa first dedicated curator of ART HK Projects for 2012

February

• ART HK repositions ASIA ONE section for 2012, now “heart” of fair
• Hong Kong Contemporary: Hotel art fair to piggyback ART HK 12

2011

July

• Hong Kong home for top-shelf White Cube art

June

• What art fairs will contemporary galleries be heading to in 2011?
• ART HK versus Art Stage Singapore: ART HK 11 dealers debate Asia’s top fair
• Art Basel takeover of ART HK: What did dealers at ART HK 11 say?
• ART HK 11 top topics media round-up: Ai Weiwei, Gao Weigang, ASIA ONE and gallery sales
• Photographer David LaChapelle in Hong Kong: Asian art scene buzzing while New York’s stagnates
• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: Gallery sales – ART FUTURES and ASIA ONE sections
• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: ART HK confirms 2012 edition to be held in May

David LaChapelle, ‘Big Boss’, 2010, chromogenic print. © David LaChapelle. Image courtesy de Sarthe Fine Art.

May

• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: What did galleries bring to ART HK 11? Picture feast
• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: Mystery man behind Hong Kong art fair success – Charles Ross
• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: Chinese artist Gao Weigang wins 2011 ART FUTURES award
• ART HK 11 Hong Kong art fair: IQ2 debater Simon de Pury on beautiful art – interview
• Hong Kong art fair ART HK 11: First day fair impressions
• Hong Kong art fair ART HK 11: Chinese contemporary art market to outgrow US and European – press release
• Hong Kong art fair ART HK 11: Rolling media round-up [UPDATED 12 June 2011]

Coverage before 2011

Want to go back even further into the history and development of Asia’s biggest art fair? Click here for ART HK 11 coverage round-up with articles dating back to 2008.

Mu Boyan, ‘Nude No 2′. Entrance to ART HK 09.

KN/CXMA

Click here to read our coverage of Art Basel Hong Kong 2013

Subscribe to Art Radar for more on contemporary art fairs in Asia

You could be our next Paid Marketing/Projects Intern! If you’re passionate about marketing and project management and keen to dive deeper into the world of contemporary Asian art read on to find out more about this exciting paid opportunity.

Responsibilities:

The Art Radar Marketing/Projects Intern will assist our team 3.5 days per week on a variety of tasks. These may include, but are not limited to,

• Maintaining the Opportunities and Asian Art Events pages
• Marketing activities for Art Radar Institute
• Social networking
• Archive management
• Readership and website statistics
• Research for articles to be published on Art Radar

The Intern will work closely with our Editor Cassandra Naji and our Founder and Executive Editor, Kate Cary Evans.

Requirements:

The successful candidate must be available to work the required number of days per week, flexibly. The following skills and abilities are also looked for:

• a firm grasp of WordPress, Facebook, Google+ and other social media platforms.
• previous experience in marketing/communications.
• computer literate in a variety of software including Excel and Google Docs.
• excellent verbal and written communicator in English. An additional Asian language is a plus.
• passionate about contemporary Asian art.

Where candidates are equal we give preference to applicants who have completed our courses.

A small remuneration will be provided. 

Length of contract: Six months

How to apply: Please email your cover letter, resume and a writing sample to our editorial team at artradarrecruitment@gmail.com. Please include ‘Marketing/Project Intern Application – (your name)’ in the subject line.

Application deadline: Thursday 30 May 2013

Riyadh-based conceptual artist Abdulnasser Gharem plans to open an arts foundation supporting emerging artists in the Saudi capital. The Amen Art Foundation, which does not yet have an official opening date, will be the first of its kind in the Kingdom. 

Abdulnasser Gharem’s Foundation will support young artists as the Saudi art scene develops.

The Amen Art Foundation aims to plug a gap in the arts infrastructure of Saudi Arabia. Speaking to The Art Newspaper, Gharem said he wants to support younger artists,

We have so many good artists here. The galleries and, unfortunately, auction houses are starting to move in but there are no institutions or foundations here to help the younger artists.

According to a press release for the exhibition “Towards the Amen Art Foundation“, held at Side by Side Gallery, Berlin, Gharem’s venture is “inspired by an extraordinary new generation of Saudi artists, film-makers, musicians and comedians”. An advocate of art education, Gharem suggests that while there might be an increase in Saudi Arabian art featured at international art biennales, museum shows and a growing number of galleries in Saudi Arabia, more effort is needed to nurture the younger generation of artists.

Rashed-Al-Shashai, ‘Stopper’, 2013, foam rubber and steel installation, 120 x 120 cm. Image courtesy Athr Gallery.

Art, government, gallery

Gharem tells The Art Newspaper that the biggest challenge doesn’t lie in raising funds for the organisation, but rather in securing support from the government,

This country is full of people who have the [necessary] money. But the problem will be getting the government’s permission to launch the foundation. Such art foundations are not part of our culture.

The Foundation will rely on the support of individuals and private institutions such as Side by Side Gallery, which is working with Gharem to develop the project. Akim Monet, CEO of the gallery, invited Gharem to mount a show of Saudi Arabian art as an introduction to the Amen Art Foundation project.

Abdulnasser Gharem, ‘No More Tears’, 2012, rubber stamps and industrial lacquer paint on 9mm Indonesian plywood board, 160 x 200 cm. Image courtesy Side by Side Gallery.

World turns to Saudi art scene

Saudi art has been gaining ground internationally, according to art watchers such as Peter Aspden. Saudi Arabia had its own pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennale, while individual artists have exhibited in the Sharjah Biennial and Berlin Biennale.

Increasing attention has also come from museums worldwide. The exhibition “Arab Express: The latest art from the Arab world” ran from June to October 2012 at the Tokyo Mori Art Museum, while from November 2012 to April 2013 the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, presented “Light from the Middle East: New Photography“ featuring Saudi photographers among others. International art fairs have also seen the participation of Saudi galleries, such as Ayyam Gallery at Art Dubai.

2013 also saw the inaugural Jeddah Art Week, a cross-city event exhibiting art by young Saudi artists. Hamza Serafi, co-founder of Athr Gallery in Jeddah, told the BBC that the event was the culmination of years of commitment from Saudi arts practitioners, as well as a turning point for artists.

Abdulnasser Gharem, ‘The Stamp (Amen)’, 2011, wood and rubber, approx. 120 x 130 x 120 cm. Image courtesy Side By Side Gallery.

About Abdulnasser Gharem

A serving colonel in the Saudi military, Gharem is one of the founders of Edge of Arabia, an independent arts initiative that critics such as David Batty in The Guardian have credited with pushing the boundaries of Saudi contemporary art. In 2012 Gharem became the highest grossing Saudi artist when a work symbolizing the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem sold for USD842,500 at an auction for Arab, Iranian and Turkish artists at Christie’s, Dubai.

 JP/CN/CXMA

Related Topics: artist-run spaces, foundations, Saudi Arabia art

Related Posts:

• Arab Spring for Saudi Art? Gallerist Hamza Serafi – interview – April 2013 – Jeddah Art Week and the changing face of Saudi art
• Young non-profit art gallery transforms Kuwaiti cultural landscape -director interview – January 2013 – how one organisation brings art to the people
• 4 Philippine artist-run spaces profiled – Asia Art Archive – December 2011 – Artist-run spaces bring a different dynamic to Manila’s gallery scene
• Middle Eastern art scene develops – September 2011 – Art Radar tracks the burgeoning contemporary movement
• First forays for Saudi art in international art market – March 2009 – Saudi art’s first auction outing: how did it do?

Subscribe to Art Radar for more on Saudi Arabian art

Art Radar, one of the leading online platforms covering contemporary art news and trends in Asia and beyond, is looking for for Volunteer Art Market Reporters to interview exhibitors and dealers at this year’s fair.

An Art Radar student reporter conducts an interview in a Hong Kong gallery.

Description 

Art Radar is collecting information on art market trends and opinions for use in upcoming editorials. Volunteer Art Market Reporters will have the opportunity to canvas influential opinions from leading art world figures at this exciting event.

Requirements

No direct experience is necessary as Volunteer Art Market Reporters will be provided with a brief questionnaire on the Art Basel Hong Kong experience, although a background knowledge of the commercial art market and art fairs is useful. Applicants must already be attending Art Basel Hong Kong to apply.

How to apply

To become an official Art Radar Volunteer Art Market Reporters for the first Art Basel Hong Kong email cassandranaji.artradar@gmail.com by Wednesday 22 May 2013.

Interested in more opportunities like this? Subscribe to Art Radar for updates.

On 16 May 2013 Para Site, Hong Kong, opens “A Journal of the Plague Year. Fear, ghosts rebels. SARS, Leslie and the Hong Kong story”. Exhibition co-curator Cosmin Costinas sat down with Art Radar to trace the history of the city through its contemporary art.

Adrian Wong, ‘Sak Gai (Chicken Kiss)’, 2007, digital print. Image courtesy the artist and Para Site.

The exhibition, which runs from 16 May to 20 July 2013, explores Hong Kong’s complex political, social, pop cultural and epidemiological history through the the work of 27 artists, the majority of whom are based in the city. Ranging over three separate spaces and comprising diverse media, “A Journal of the Plague Year“ includes the work of artists such as Ai Weiwei, Bernd Behr and Moe Satt.

Drawing on implicit commonalities between historic outbreaks of disease in the city and the SARS crisis of 2003, the exhibition examines notions of fear, Other and the creation of Hong Kong identity. Cosmin Costinas, co-curator of “A Journal of the Plague Year” along with Inti Guerrero, points out that while the story told is that of Hong Kong, the themes are universal, and discusses whether communal fear and exclusion may actually work to unite a city rather than divide it.

Bernd Behr, ‘Amoy Gardens’, 2003-2007, 35mm slide projection and audio. Image courtesy the artist and Para Site.

Is this the first time you and fellow “Journal” curator Inti Guerrero have worked together? How did you find the experience?

Yes it’s the first time. It was an enriching experience, it went very well. We work well as a team.

As incomers to the island, how would you describe the experience of putting together an exhibition dealing with Hong Kong identity and issues of Otherness?

There are very different types of Other in Hong Kong; there are many ways of being an Other. I think it’s important to remember there is not only one experience of being an outsider in the city. But beyond that point, this exhibition was primarily done in dialogue with the artists in the show, and most of them have very strong bonds either with Hong Kong, or with the experiences and events we present in the exhibition. Ultimately, the city is being discussed through their perspectives and not through ours as curators.

The exhibition title is interesting. “A Journal of the Plague Year” references a Daniel Defoe novel of the same name, which tells the story of the plague sweeping through eighteenth century London. Why refer to this work?

We had the map of the exhibition and the association with [Hong Kong singer-actor] Leslie Cheung in mind, and we discussed these ideas with a local journalist who was to eventually become an artist in the exhibition, we produced an interview with her which is included as an art piece in the show, Fionnuala McHugh. She’s the one who pointed out the many similarities between things that happened in Hong Kong during the SARS crisis and events in Daniel Defoe’s book. And this led us to assume the universality and general recurrence of certain patterns of behaviour during an epidemic and during moments of fear. There’s an uncanny connection between the description in A Journal, Defoe’s Journal, and in Hong Kong in 2003: there is a looming war, the Anglo-Dutch war while the epidemic took over London, and of course SARS was happening in the same weeks as the invasion of Iraq in 2003. It’s very powerful to look at the front pages of Hong Kong newspapers at the beginning of the war, the headlines were always about Iraq with stories about SARS at the bottom of the page. But after only two or three weeks, despite the outbreak of war, SARS had completely taken over as the major catastrophe of the day. What we were interested in was the development of fear. And this was very strongly present in the work of Defoe: fear on an individual level but also fear overtaking a city, fear on a collective level.

The subtitle is an interesting counterpoint to Defoe, referencing science and pop culture, the 2003 SARS epidemic and Leslie Cheung, a Cantopop icon. Can you explain these disparate associations?

Leslie Cheung was really one of the first figures of the 1980s who helped Hong Kong define itself culturally, both within Asia and internationally. So he became in many ways associated with Hong Kong and a metaphor for Hong Kong. But it’s very interesting to note that as much as he was a popular hero, he was in fact a very unlikely hero. This was both because he was gay in a very conservative society, which meant he was part of the mainstream but outside mainstream expectations, and he was also somebody suffering from depression who committed suicide in a highly symbolic manner, by throwing himself from the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in the centre of the city. His death at the height of the SARS epidemic shocked Hong Kong as much as SARS itself, because he played a major role in defining to Hong Kongers who they are and he had decided to end his life in this spectacular fashion. So we’re trying to trace how his persona and public life reflect the changing identity of Hong Kong across the last thirty years, from a British colony within Asia, to a place of uncertainty and transition.

Ricky Yeung Sau-churk, ‘Man and Cage’, 1987. Image courtesy the artist and Para Site.

The exhibition traces historical events, cultural trends, contemporary politics and narrative and involves 27 artists. Can you explain more concretely what the show looks like?

There are three venues plus another work which takes place outside, and they look quite different from each other. Para Site is the main space and the majority of the artworks are here. We built new walls here, so there’s a very particular architecture to the exhibition space and a very precise navigation from artwork to artwork, from room to room, and therefore from feeling to feeling.

“A Journal of the Plague Year” concentrates on 2003, a year which saw the city experience the SARS crisis, as well as civil unrest in the form of street protests. While obviously a seminal time for the people of Hong Kong, why does that year matter for people outside the island?

I think that the main relevance of the stories we tell is their universality: fear, exclusion, the Other. These stories have been happening and are still happening around the world every day. They’re urgent and contemporary everywhere today, in Britain, in the States, in Hong Kong, and we try to reflect that quite strongly in the exhibition. Of course, we have works that deal with the way in which the Chinese were singled out and stereotyped. For example, there is a work by Ming Wong which is a collection of movie posters representing the Chinese in a very stereotypical way. And we have the work of Samson Young, which captures sound along the border of Hong Kong and mainland China. But we also have the work of a Taiwanese artist that deals with the fear of the United States being over-run by Mexican immigrants. So you can see from that example that we start from a very particular story, Hong Kong’s, but we give it this international relevance. The Hong Kong story is quite provocative because it is actually a universal story. We want this to be obvious to someone coming to the exhibition: whenever there is a local issue we associate it with an artwork which places it within a wider context. This is part of the curatorial strategy.

Moe Satt, ‘F n’ F (Face & Fingers)’, 2009, 8 black and white photographs with text. Image courtesy the artist and Para Site.

How did you select the 27 artists featured in “A Journal of the Plague Year”?

In different ways. Really it was a process of research with Inti [Guerrero], a process of clarifying both the concept and the different narratives, and along this process different artists or artworks entered our conversation. Then the inclusion of these artists opened conversations in their turn. I think this is the general way in which we like to curate, by opening dialogue with artists or artworks. And as part of this process some of the artists produced new works for the exhibition – Lee Kit, Ai Weiwei, Ming Wong and James T. Hong – which again opened different implications and opened new paths for the show.

I want to add that we tried to expand and enlarge the group on show beyond the usual suspects of the Hong Kong visual art scene. We tried to work with people from Hong Kong theatre like Zuni Icosahedron, and we included in the exhibition as an art piece one of the most interesting contemporary writers in Hong Kong, Dung Kai-cheung. So we did this exhibition through the gaze of Hong Kongers, and beyond the visual art scene. I think that’s something that’s been growing and we’ve been refining, and this project was the sharpest manifestation of it, and if it works out this will have a major impact on the way in which we’re imagining our work here.

Ai Weiwei’s installation deals with the very current issue of milk powder and its links to xenophobia against mainland Chinese. What is it like curating the work of an artist who is not only so well-known, but also so vocal about his art and his politics?

I think several artists in the exhibition are actually quite vocal about their political position, and their principles from a more general perspective. There are several that have strong personalities and a strongly recognisable position, and it’s a very challenging and interesting process because when people have these positions and when we have an assertive framework for the exhibition, this means there’s a constant dialogue and a negotiation between ourselves and the artists. And that’s what makes it challenging and an interesting curatorial process, this is what makes it more than just selecting works and putting them together but makes it a constant delicate political process of negotiation. This is the case not only with Ai Weiwei but with several artists in the exhibition. Especially with those who have produced new works in dialogue with our proposals, we have accepted some of the propositions of the artists but not others, it’s a complex landscape.

Adrian Wong also reacts to issues of contamination linked to corruption on the mainland of China. Can you tell Art Radar more about the work?

It’s a large scale photograph of Wong dressed in the typical suit of a politician or businessman, holding and kissing a chicken. It’s a work with a strong and direct visual impact. I think the irony is very obvious, I think the visual strategy has a very immediate impact and is communicable to people whether they are familiar with all the implications of the work or not, the whole discussion around corruption in China, or whether they just approach the issues of the exhibition in China and bird flu scare from a general perspective. I think it works for everyone.

Why is Lygia Pape’s Divisor, a public performance piece originally performed in 1968 in Brazil, a suitable inclusion in the exhibition?

I think it’s a perfect representation of a kind of tension we have in the exhibition. Because you have a group of people divided from each other by this cloth but at the same time they’re united in one physical organism, a clumsy body moving together, and in a way this is a perfect image. These people are divided from each other by fear and paranoia in a quarantine or isolation situation, but there’s also an awareness of belonging together in a community. This cloth functions very paradoxically, dividing people into individuals but also creating a community.

Ming Wong, ‘After Chinatown’, 2012, video (duration: 7:09 min), photographic print by Carlos Vasquez. Image courtesy the artist and Para Site.

To end where we began, back with Leslie Cheung, can you talk about Lee Kit’s exploration of what Cheung meant and perhaps still means to Hong Kongers?

This is one of the works produced specially for the exhibition. It’s a karaoke video that comes with a whole karaoke room built for it at Para Site, so it’s quite a striking presence. The karaoke video is attached to a Cheung song, quite a sad song from one of his movies. I think that this whole situation, this song, is one of the sharpest illustrations of a very Hong Kong spirit of the moment. In the video there are images of the whole street protest from 2003, together with images of Leslie. It’s an acute analysis of both the fears which were sparked in that year, but also the hopes which emerged within that year and all the disappointments that came along the way, and the ways in which they changed and mutated. Everybody in this story got a little older and little bit more bitter in the last ten years. So in that sense it’s a sharp but also melancholic way of talking about Hong Kong. And I think the room that he has built has a lot of the ambiguity that karaoke has of bringing people together but also a something of a melancholic sense of solitude. And it also explicitly brings together the different stories of 2003: it talks about Leslie, SARS, the July protests, you could even say it talks about the relationship with China and all the things which have affected Hong Kong in the last 10 years and made it the strangely mutating metropolis that it is at the moment.

CN/KN/HH

Related Topics: Hong Kong artists, curatorial practice, interviews with curators, Hong Kong exhibitions

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In the short film “Seven Artists in Delhi: Gigi Scaria”, the first in a series of videos about Indian artists working in Delhi published by The Guardian in 2011, Scaria talks about how, through his art, he explores the socio-cultural hierarchies created through architecture and city planning.

As he takes viewers around New Delhi, Scaria explains how he creates contrasts by displaying his sculptural installations against the backdrop of the urban landscape of the city.

At 1:15 – “I do work with the city’s social and architectural space… it’s a kind of contrast between these two ironies… one is that, you don’t have a space to live, on the other side you have lots of space, so this was something that I was trying to capture.”

At 1:46 – “For me it’s more of a symbolic way in which authority looks at progress. It’s like the slogan ‘incredible India’, which [has been] one of the successful slogans [over the past] ten years. How do you make it incredible? You can’t make it incredible by the amount of poverty which we have or the amount of slums we have. We can call India incredible in many aspects.”

Gigi Scaria, ‘Post’, 2008, sculpture: wood, mirror glass, electric bulb and paint, 2.5 feet x 10 inches x 12 feet. Image courtesy Chemould Prescott Road.

Migration and displacement

Gigi Scaria (b. 1973) is a painter, sculptor and video artist. He creates site-specific sculptural installations on the theme of migration and displacement. In an artist’s note on his website he says,

With these narratives I am aiming to generate a multidimensional dialogue within the social system that I am a part of. Even though the boundaries are marked and specified this is an attempt to respond and negotiate.

As independent critic and curator Gayatri Sinha writes in an essay, also published on the artist’s website, “Gigi’s particular position is to investigate how city structures, social constructs, and the view of location is translated into social prejudice and class attitude.”

Gigi Scaria, ‘Panic City’, 2006, single channel video with sound (duration: 3 minutes). Image courtesy Chemould Prescott Road.

Art career to date

After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in painting from the College of Fine Arts, Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) in 1995, Scaria moved to New Delhi and obtained an M.A. in painting from the Jamia Millia University in 1998. He lives and works in New Delhi today.

His work has been included in notable international exhibitions of contemporary Indian art. He was represented by Videospace at FIAC 2010 and featured in ”Tolstoy Farm: Archive of Utopia”, curated by Gayatri Singha in 2011, and the third Singapore Biennale, curated by Russell Storer and Trevor Smith in 2011. Scaria also received wide recognition for his interactive video installation, Elevator from the Sub-continent, part of the 54th Venice Biennale in 2011.

 JP/KN/HH

Related Topics: Indian artists, contemporary art in New Delhi, site-specific art, video interviews with artists

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In April 2013, four international and two local artists gathered for 25 days in Cheng-Long Wetlands, a conservation preserve that sits beside a remote coastal village in Taiwan’s Yunlin County, to take part in an environmental artist residency and community renewal project that has been running for four years.

Ya-chu Kang, ‘Reservations’, 2013, bamboo table, recycled chairs, sisal rope, oyster shells, natural cotton fabric, Cyanotype made with discarded cooking pots, kitchen tools, found objects collected at the seashore and shapes gifted by local children. Photograph credit: Timothy S. Allen.

Organised by Kuan-Shu Educational Foundation, supported by the Yunlin County Government and the Taiwan Forestry Bureau and curated by American curator Jane Ingram Allen, Cheng-Long Wetlands International Environmental Art Project has brought artists from across the world to the tiny village as part of an effort to help residents find some value in what was once viewed as nothing more than a natural disaster.

The high-density fish farming, agricultural production and heavy industry in the area requires large amounts of fresh water to operate, a need met by pumping up huge quantities of ground water from aquifers. The result: significant land subsidence. Yunlin County, located in the southwest of Taiwan, is one of the most severely affected regions and much of the area now sits below sea level. It is flooded several times a year by typhoons and heavy rains, and saltwater intrusion has caused salinity levels in the soil and water to rise substantially, making the land difficult to grow in. The first big flood hit the rural village of ChengLong, situated north of Taiwan’s fourth largest city, Tainan, over 25 years ago and today, much of the land the community occupies is under water continuously, although the depth of this water fluctuates with the seasons.

Through the Cheng-Long art project, along with the environmental education efforts of Kuan-Shu Educational Foundation, the wetlands are slowly but steadily being transformed into a cultural asset. The theme for 2013 was “On the Table – Aquaculture and the Environment”, which, according to Ingram Allen in the exhibition text, means that this year’s site-specifc sculptures focused on

… acquaculture, the primary livelihood in the Cheng-Long area, and intend to raise public awareness about how wildlife and the environment are affected by what we put on the table to eat. The phrase ‘on the table’ in English also means putting something up for discussion, and with this project we want to open up community dialogue….

Artists tour the Cheng-Long Wetlands. A work from the inaugural year of the project can be seen in the foreground. Photograph credit: Timothy S. Allen.

Collecting bamboo along the coastline. The bamboo poles come from abandoned oyster farms. Photography credit: Thomas S. Allen.

Instead of an open call for artists, as was the case in previous years, in 2013, Ingram Allen and the organisers invited artists who had submitted outstanding proposals for previous editions of the project, as well as well-known environmental artists, to submit a proposal. The 2013 artists, selected from these submissions, included,

• Giorgio Tessadri (Italy/Belgium)
• Johan Sietzema (Netherlands)
• Kuo-chun Chiu (Taiwan)
• Michael Rofka (Germany)
• Michele Brody (USA)
• Ya-chu Kang (Taiwan)

As an artist and art critic, Ingram Allen has been increasingly drawn to ephemeral and site-specific art practices. “I think it’s sort of liberating,” she says. “You don’t feel that your art is so precious that you have to keep it forever.” As a curator, she encourages the artists in the exhibitions she curates to make outdoor works that do as little damage as possible to the environment in which they are placed. In Cheng-Long, resident artists are required to make their installations entirely from biodegradable or recycled materials found locally: oyster shells, common reeds (Phragmites australis), driftwood, bamboo and found objects collected at a nearby recycling centre.

Giorgio Tessadri, ‘Element’, 2013,  recycled and new bamboo, non-toxic paint, sisal rope. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Johan Sietzema, ‘Food-Prints’ (during installation), 2013, recycled and new bamboo, reeds, other local vegetation. Photograph credit: Timothy S. Allen.

Kuo-chun Chiu, ‘Fish for Every Year’, 2013, recycled and new bamboo, recycled glass, sisal rope. Photograph by the artist.

Collectively called Element, Italian artist Giorgio Tessadri’s three separate geometric sculptures, made primarily from bamboo stenciled with environmentally themed questions, spread out across the wetlands, weaving through the windows of a bird watching building and leaping from the mud and reeds of the wetland. Johan Sietzema’s artwork, Food-Prints, consists of woven fish and traps suspended within a huge structure of upright bamboo poles. In his work Fish for Every Year, local artist Kuo-chun Chiu referenced a traditional Chinese proverb related to Chinese New Year celebrations, in which diners leave some of the fish on the table to ensure a full year of food ahead. For Chiu, the proverb is analogous to the importance of preserving natural resources for the future.

Ya-chu Kang, ‘Reservations’ (detail), 2013, bamboo, recycled chairs, sisal rope, oyster shells, natural cotton fabric, Cyanotype made with discarded cooking pots, kitchen tools, found objects collected at the seashore and shapes gifted by local children. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Michele Brody, ‘Water Table Tea House’, 2013, oyster shells, recycled and new bamboo, sisal rope, found and discarded traditional windows. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Michael Rofka, ‘Milkfish’, 2013, recycled and new bamboo, earth/clay, sisal rope, reeds and other local vegetation. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Ya-chu Kang, also from Taiwan, set up a dark room in Cheng-Long and used the Cyanotype technique to photographically print found objects related to food onto a huge tablecloth. In the finished work, called Reservations, the cloth was placed over a huge bamboo table, which was then mounted in the wetlands and surrounded by chairs collected from the recycling centre and discarded in the village. With her work, Water Table Tea House, American artist Michele Brody sought to create a place in which the community can discuss and contemplate their surroundings and the environmental issues they face. Michael Rofka, from Germany, created an enourmous, hollow work called Milkfish. Viewers enter the fish through a small opening in its side and, moving to the head of the fish, can peer through large holes to “see the world through [its] eyes”, as described in the exhibition text.

The Cheng-Long project artists visit a local bamboo craftsman. Photography credit: Timothy S Allen.

Artists, volunteers and local residents gather together in the evening. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Cultural exchange is also central to the project. Each artist worked closely with a Taiwanese volunteer and a classroom of children. Artists visited local masters to learn techniques related to traditional Taiwanese crafts, such as how to cut and curve bamboo. They also learned about fish and oyster farming and other means livelihood in the area, as well as social practices, such as religious festivals. Upon arrival in the village, artists were asked to introduce themselves and their home country or city to the elementary school pupils, and, for the first time since the project began four years ago, a public symposium was held at Yunlin County Mango Art Café that aimed to encourage discourse on the project from the wider community.

When the inaugural project was announced to village residents in 2010, many were sceptical of its value to their community. According to Ingram Allen, the Kuan-Shu Educational Foundation, due to their previous experience working in Cheng-Long, “really paved the way and prepared the children and the community to receive the contemporary artists from around the world and other spots in Taiwan”. In 2013, not only are residents increasingly willing to contribute their time, expertise and manpower to the project, the village itself is changing, with new buildings, including a community hall and a number of houses, dotted between the traditional red brick farmhouses.

Giorgio Tessadri, ‘Element’, 2013, recycled and new bamboo, non-toxic paint, sisal rope. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

Johan Sietzema, ‘Food-Prints’ (during installation), 2013, recycled and new bamboo, reeds, other local vegetation. Photograph credit: Timothy S Allen.

The artist residency portion of the Cheng-Long Wetlands Environmental Art Project ran from 11 April to 6 May 2013, and the project was officially opened to the public on the weekend of 5 to 6 May 2013. The artworks will remain on view in Cheng-Long Wetlands for one year or until they decompose.

KN/JC

Related Topics: sculpture, public art, site-specific art, art and the community, art events in Taiwan, environment

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