M+ - The Sigg Collection

Before the completion of the long-overdue M+ Museum of Visual Culture, to be constructed on Hong Kong's West Kowloon area of reclamation, there have been several events and activities organised to keep alive the promise of M+ until the time when procrastination and indescribable bureaucracy finally gives way and this city of 7 million at last has a venue that does justice to a city of its size.

The latest event is the public display of work donated by Swiss collector Dr. Uli Sigg back in 2012. This work will form the nucleus of the M+ collection and it certainly serves that purpose.

Over 80 pieces of contemporary Chinese art made between 1974 and 2011 appear to comprise a valid representation of the most successful contemporary art made in China during those years. Many of the most renowned artists in Chinese contemporary art have work in the collection and I found it a very worthwhile and enjoyable show.

The line up included Ai Wei Wei, Cao Fei, Yang Fudong, Wang Keping and Zhang Xiaogang,  but my particular favourites were: Huang Yong Ping's 'Six Small Turntables' of 1988, Lin Yilin's 'Safely manoeuvring across Lin He Road' of 1995, Song Dong's 'Breathing - Houhai (Back Sea) - Tiananmen Square' of 1996,  Zhang Huan's 'Family Tree' of 2000 and Lu Ring's 'Untitled' of 2000 (countless numbers of tiny squares hand-drawn on an extremely long roll of paper).

This collection sets M+ off to a good start. What Hong Kong really needs is a world-class collection of contemporary art, a stimulating calendar of international exhibitions and a forum for local Hong Kong artists to promote themselves. The first two are very desirable but the last one is a definate necessity!

Zhang Huan - Family Tree, 2000

Song Dong - Breathing - Houhai (Back Sea) - Tiananmen Square', 1996 

Huang Yong Ping - Six Small Turntables, 1988

Lu Ring - Untitled, 2000

Event Horizon - Anthony Gormley in Hong Kong

After a year's delay Antony Gormley's city-wide installation 'Event Horizon' finally appeared on the Hong Kong skyline.
A year ago, a suicide in the city frightened sponsors away but finally Hong Kong joined world cities such as London, New York, Sao Paolo, and Rio de Janeiro in integrating Gormley's work into the local environment.
The project was initiated in 2007 when it was first recognised that over half of the world's population were living in cities and was first installed in London.
Antony Gormley's sculptures (cast from his own body) stare out across the cities in which they have been installed, surveying the cityscape, trying to understand how they fit into this chaotic, man-made jungle.
The installation is due to be dismantled on May 18th but the memory (for me at least) will last much longer.

Giuseppe Penone at Gagosian Hong Kong

The exhibition ‘Leaves of Stone’ opened at the Gagosian HK in January 2016 presenting art that was as poetic as the exhibition title suggested.

In Foglie di pietra, several freestanding pieces comprised trees cast in bronze, their branches entwined, embracing stone architectural fragments that had been carved into decorative, classical acanthus leaves.

Another series, Indistinti confine, featured marble trees, their limbs removed and replaced with bronze knots. Sharp, rusting spikes appeared to pierce the trees in specific places, from where the rust seemed to bleed down and into the marble trunks.

A large drawing took up one entire wall comprised of thorns, thousands of them arranged as though to describe a pair of lips – Spine d’acacia.

Riflesso del bronzo - a highly polished wall-mounted bronze mirror reminds us that mirrors in antiquity presented to the viewer a warm, almost sun-drenched reflection. The mirror was accompanied by its ‘reflection’, a casting that was then itself cast and so on until there were the 8 versions we can see in the exhibition.

Through handcrafted stone and marble Penone comments on the millennia-old relationship between mankind and nature and between past and present cultures and throughout his work he achieves a poetry that takes on physical form.

Kent Foran - Photographer

I was recently looking at the work of photographer Kent Foran and felt provoked to put a mention here in the hope that others would also appreciate his work.

Kent works at the Hong Kong Design Institute in the English Language Department but away from the HKDI campus Kent is prolific photographer. 

People often discuss the relative merits of photographers and what may be the reason for the success of their work. For me it is quite simple. It has nothing to do with the equipment being used or how expensive the camera. It is not even due to the education of the individual, although it can steer someone in the general, correct direction. For me it is quite simply having an eye for an image. We may call it the 'Decisive moment' as Cartier-Bresson did, or describe how someone is good at composition. The fact remains that when an artist creates a work, many elements come together to form a powerful resolution, an equilibrium of qualities that is difficult to describe in detail. In fact to do so would be similar to dissecting a beautiful and noble animal in order to understand what makes it so. 

Kent, for me, has a terrific 'eye'. His work speaks for itself, so please visit his website and  you see what I mean.

http://www.kentforan.com

Leonardo Drew at Pearl Lam Gallery, Hong Kong.

As I  entered the Pedder Building in Central on my way to visit the exhibition 1,000 islands at the Simon Lee gallery I saw a sign advertising another gallery opening, this time upstairs at the Pearl Lam Gallery. The exhibition was the first display of work by Leonardo Drew in Asia and was a wonderful surprise for me.
For the last few months I had been enjoying videos of his work on Youtube.com and poring over images on internet search engines, thoroughly enjoying Leonardo's work. So, completely out of the blue I was able to see them up close and finally appreciate what it is that he does.

Apparently inspired by a city dump that surrounded his childhood home, Leonardo Drew carefully and systematically constructs chaos from material that he 'ages' and 'distresses' in order to instil his works with an atmosphere of haphazard juxtaposition that overlies careful and considered logic.

As a sculptor myself I could sense the enjoyment that he takes in the transformational process that creates the work. From the way that one component section leads onto the next (citing Mondrian as a reference), or how one material leads us into the neighbouring material, it's possible to follow his train of thought and the way the work has lead the creator in it's urge to be born. The works are organic in form and it is as if the works have grown naturally, with Leonardo providing the help and assistance that the work demanded.

A wonderful exhibition.

Number 18C

Number 18C - Detail

Number 19C

Number 20C

Number 11C

Number 11C - Detail

Number 21C

Number 21C - Detail

Number 18C - Detail

Number 9C - Detail

Number 9C - Detail

Number 9C - Detail

Nam June Paik: The Late Style - Gagosian Hong Kong

It is a well-known fact that one of the most important and rewarding aspects of sensual pleasure is the anticipation. In full knowledge of this on the evening I arrived at the Gagosian Gallery in Central to see the first exhibition in Hong Kong of the work of Nam June Paik, I deliberately delayed entering the exhibition space by accepting a glass of champagne and calmly reading the press releases in the reception area. After around 15 minutes and suitably primed I then decided it was time to see the work.

I first became aware of Paik’s work in 1977/78 during the foundation course I attended at Jacob Kramer College of Art in the UK (now renamed Leeds College of Art) but I hadn’t had the opportunity of experiencing much of his work since that time so this was a genuine pleasure for me.

As it states in the gallery’s press release Paik’s work represents a ‘lifelong exploration of the role of technology in culture’ and Gagosian’s exhibition of Paik’s work illustrated this perfectly.  Sometimes playful or comical, sometimes critical, displaying a subjective personal view one minute and then becoming almost cynically objective the next Paik explores mankind’s experience of life that has today become inseparable from communicative media and the technology that allows the universal spread of information, whether useful or not.

There were so many highlights in the show but if I had to select one for comment it would have to be Golden Buddha, 2005. A gilded bronze Buddha sits serenely on a white platform as if intently watching a colour television set that broadcasts the image of the Buddha’s own head by means of the Closed-circuit video camera positioned directly above the TV screen. The video camera focuses tightly on the Buddha’s face. It feels too close. We can see nothing on the screen apart from the face of the Buddha, is it a fragment of a Buddha?, is it whole Buddha?, the location is a mystery, the context is totally lost.

Is this Paik’s commentary on the way the media distorts reality, or on the way it selects which parts of the real story it will relay to the viewer? When we appreciate another culture, we attempt to be respectful, we are careful not to offend by misreading culturally embedded symbols and yet in this piece of work by Paik, the camera doesn’t record what the gallery viewer sees, it ignores the entirety of the scene and selects only the face to zoom in on.

Is this Paik’s intention? Maybe it is, maybe not.  As an artist myself I feel the most important function of an artwork is to throw out these questions. For me this is one of, and probably the main function of a work of art: to ask questions. I came away from this exhibition thinking about these subjects, all provoked by Paik’s work. Unfortunately Paik may have left us but his work is still very much alive and it continues to ask questions of us all.

Golden Buddha, 2005

Bakelite Robot, 2002

359 Canal Street, 1991

Chinese Memory, 2005

The Disappearance of Urban Comfort - Ming Pao Weekly, Hong Kong

Following an opportunity presented to me by my friend John Batten, local art critic (see:http://www.aicahk.org/eng/about.asp), I was invited to write a short opinion piece for the weekly magazine section of the Hong Kong publisher Ming Pao.

I decided to write about something I have noticed happening in Hong Kong since my arrival here in 1993, namely the disappearance of the vernacular street buildings that featured open colonnaded walkways at street level that offered shelter from the sun and the rain. The open street-level arcades blurred the distinction between indoors and outdoors and displayed a consideration for the general public that is rapidly disappearing.

I enjoyed writing this article very much and I hope that I will have further opportunities in the future.

Here is the English Language version: http://www.abhk.org/the-disappearance-of-urban-comfort/

"I still have strong memories from my youth in Leeds, a city in northern England when, caught out in a rainstorm during a shopping trip (a frequent occurrence), I dodged into one of the Victorian arcades in the city centre that have since been combined into the ‘Victoria Quarter’ shopping district. Here it was possible to continue shopping or to take a cup of tea safe from the downpour. What a wonderful experience it was! The arcades were similar in appearance to the Burlington Arcade near to the Royal Academy in London, except that the shops were much more affordable.

In fact many cities in the West wisely built covered shopping arcades or colonnaded pavements, one notable example being the famous arcades in the Italian city of Bologna where there are around 40 kilometers (25 miles) of covered walkways in a variety of styles that allows pedestrians to reach every part of the city centre. In fact streets featuring continuous open arcades are expressions of the ancient Hellenistic city that was intended to improve urban comfort.
Many years later when I arrived in Hong Kong in May 1993, I discovered that the old buildings of Hong Kong had similar continuous open arcades providing a different type of covered shopping experience and one uniquely suited to the local climate. During those first few months in the city I learnt what Summer rain could be like in Hong Kong and how pleasant it was to walk the streets under the cover of the overhanging buildings that were supported at intervals by columns. This was a design perfectly in tune with the climate and culture of Hong Kong. Whether it was originally designed with this community-based concept in mind or not, that is what developed. This was surely providing the same kind of urban comfort that the classical Greeks of Athens also enjoyed. The covered walkways of Hong Kong provided shade from the blistering sun and shelter from the bouncing rain.
However, not so long after arriving I noticed that these old buildings were disappearing. One or two lucky examples were retained and reconverted into up-market bars and restaurants but many were demolished, and what was erected in their place? More often than not it was a modern, efficient, glass block tower that emphatically made a different kind of statement. The urban comfort was locked away safely inside and there was a very explicit separation between those on the inside and those outside. You are either inside enjoying the comfort, protection and cool air (or warmth in winter) or you are outside at the mercy of the elements.
This does not embody a community-based, humanist approach to urban design; it embodies the opposite: exclusion and separation. The traditional, vernacular street architecture presents a friendly face; the new vision seems decidedly mean in comparison.
These buildings also serve to represent the culture of the city. This culture is what draws visitors here, eager to wander around a city quite different from their own. What a terrible tragedy to erase this valuable characteristic.
As a footnote I have recently read of plans to remove the trams from Central, can this be true? These trams are just as much a part of Hong Kong’s unique culture as the vernacular architecture with the wonderful ‘corner buildings’, and yet they are also more than that. They are a viable mode of public transport. One journey on a tram will illustrate perfectly that they are not filled by tourists taking photographs (although that is certainly an attraction for them), they are full of local people shopping and/or travelling to or from work at a very affordable cost.

If this scheme has any truth to it, before long everything that has made Hong Kong unique will have been erased. Would the UK Government remove the red buses and black taxicabs from the streets of central London? Would the Italian Government remove the gondolas from the canals?
Surely this is one ill-advised ‘scheme too far’."

The published Chinese Language version was translated by MingPao staff.