Chroniques Hongkongaises - Update

We are pleased to announce the additional participation of artists Virgile Simon Bertrand, Evangelo Costadimas and Syren Johnstone in the exhibition and the following programme of events:-

PRIVATE VIEW & LECTURE | VERNISSAGE ET LECTURE

Gérard Henry  - Hong Kong in Turmoil: the crisis of identity amongst Hong Kong artists during the retrocession of Hong Kong to China (in French)

Gérard Henry  - Hong Kong dans la tourmente: Crise d’identité chez les artistes hongkongais lors de la rétrocession de Hong Kong à la Chine (en français)

Diorama Rue Raspail

4 July 2010 | 4 juillet 2010

17.00 – 20.00

OPENING PARTY | VERNISSAGE COMMUN

5 July 2010 | 5 juillet 2010

CHRONIQUES HONGKONGAISES– Book signing | Séance de dédicaces

Forum Harmonia Mundi Bookstore

5 rue du President Wilson, Arles. Tel : 04 90 93 65 39

 6 July 2010 | 6 juillet 2010

From 19.00 | à partir de 19.00 heures 

Chroniques Hongkongaises - Nick Cheuk | Gérard Henry | Riddick Douglas Ning | Kurt Tong | Kacey Wong | Curator Davina Lee

DIORAMA PROJECTS is pleased to announce details of its second annual exhibition at Diorama Rue Raspail, Arles from 3 -10 July 2010. 

The exhibition borrows its title from the 2008 book Chroniques Hongkongaises by author Gérard Henry, a unique compilation of personal observations and commentaries on first ten years of Hong Kong’s post-colonial history.  Through the works of five artists from Hong Kong the exhibition offers a complex and highly personal perspective on the territorial and cultural anomaly of postmodern Hong Kong against the context of its recent history.

Created over a period of ten years, visual artist, architect and recipient of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council’s Best Artist of the Year 2009 award, Kacey Wong’s Drift City series of deceptively whimsical photographs charts the global wanderings of a fugitive skyscraper, the architectural symbol of Hong Kong.  From Beijing, London and Tokyo to Helsinki, Cairo and Berlin, Wong’s lone skyscraper drifts from one urban environment to another in search of utopia.   Kurt Tong’s The Queen, The Chairman and I comprise a series of photographs that reconnect the artist with Hong Kong of the past through the recollections of his extended family.  Learning of the past through their memories, Tong’s photographs are a revelation, humanizing the political and social upheaval that brought his family to Hong Kong.  Hong Kong is the backdrop for Nick Cheuk’s urban fable All Little Living Things, his masked characters playing out in Hong Kong’s streets, offices and subway a powerful and ultimately tragic narrative describing lost innocence and disillusionment.  Graduating with distinction from Hong Kong’s City University of Creative Media, and winner of the Creative Media Award 2009, Riddick Douglas Ning’s Hong Kong Happenings consider the complex relationship between photography and painting.  The artist’s transposition of key works from the canon of Western art to present day Hong Kong in all its postmodern glory range from the satirical The Spoiling of Adam, to the lyrical work The Scavengers, replacing Millet’s glaneuses with members of Hong Kong’s elderly army of recyclers.  The exhibition will also include a special video work by Gerard Henry based around his Chroniques Hongkongaises.

DIORAMA RUE RASPAIL

26 Rue Raspail, Arles, France

3 - 10 July 2010

Opening times:

13.00 – 18.00

Candida Höfer - Ben Brown Fine Arts, Hong Kong

Candida Höfer: In Italy

May 25^th – July 10^th, 2010

Ben Brown Fine Arts is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of works by internationally-renowned German photographer Candida Höfer running from May 25^th to July 10^th at Ben Brown Fine Arts (301 Pedder Building, 12 Pedder Street, Central, Hong Kong). Candida Höfer’s exhibition will mark the first solo show for the Pedder gallery, following the close of Ben Brown Fine Art’s successful pop up exhibition space in ifc mall. Candida Höfer photographs rooms in public places regarded as pivotal centres of cultural life, such as libraries, museums, theaters, universities, as well as historic houses and palaces, most notably the palace of Versailles in France. Each meticulously composed space is marked with the richness of human activity, yet largely devoid of human presence. 

Largely hailed by the European vanguards of art as one the greatest architectural photographers, Höfer’s rhythmically patterned images present a universe of interiors constructed by human intention, unearthing patterns of order, logic, and disruption imposed on these spaces by absent creators and inhabitants. The artist rigorously numbers and arranges her works according to size and dimensions, in line with the teachings of the Düsseldorf Art Academy's renowned professors Bernd and Hilla Becher.

“I photograph in public and semi-public spaces that date from various epochs. These are spaces available to everyone. They are places where you can meet and communicate, where you can share or receive knowledge, where you can relax and recover.”

                  Candida Höfer

Candida Höfer – Biography

Candida Höfer lives and works in Cologne. Having completed her training at the Schmölz-Huth Studio, she became a pupil of Bernd and Hilla Becher in 1976, and one can immediately identify in her aesthetics the clear influence of a school of thought and photography privileging the physical spaces and intent on capturing the subtle variations which occur within it. Alongside the other great photographers of the Contemporary era Andreas Gursky, Thomas Struth, Axel Hütte and Thomas Ruff, Candida Höfer belongs to the School of Düsseldorf, a movement known for its neutral and methodical analysis of the spaces which we, as contemporary human beings, inhabit.

Her work has been shown and recognised internationally, including at the Kunsthalle in Basel and Berne, the Louvre, the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin. Candida Höfer has also represented Germany at the Venice Biennale in 2003 and participated in documenta 11 (2002). Many of Höfer’s works are represented in major museum and private collections.

Taxi - The Front Seat: Featured Creative Personality Virgile Simon Bertrand

Virgile Simon Bertrand discusses architecture, photography and the people who influenced him

...Everything we do is affected by the space around us and that connection - as well as the distance between me and the subject - is really what drives me when I make a photograph. I never became an architect but in a way, photography can contain the same fundamental process in architecture. Writings by Le Corbusier or Louis Kahn told me a lot more than the few critical essays I read about photography (and totally forgot about)... 

Full interview at http://www.designtaxi.com/article.php?article_id=100755

Collectivity - A new initiative from 1a Space, Hong Kong

COLLECTIVITY

Virgile Simon Bertrand, Chris Chan, Enoch Cheung, Jaffa Lam, Lam Hiu Tung, Lam Wai Kit, Lau Ching Ping, Laura Li, Chris Lo, Ivy Ma, Phoebe Man, Hiram To, Annie Wan and Ki Wong.

1a space will be launching the exhibition COLLECTIVITY featuring the work of Hong Kong’s most prominent contemporary artists.  The exhibition will be held in two locations, at Stand C1 at the Art HK and at 1a space.  Part of the proceeds of sale will be used to support 1a space’s new curator initiative which will provide talented new curators in Hong Kong with the opportunity to curate their own exhibition at 1a space.  

Please join us on Thursday 27 May from 6pm at the Cattle Depot to celebrate the launch of the exhibition and the COLLECTIVITY series with a special performance by artist Kelvin Cheung.  Transportation on a first come first served basis from the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre to 1a space will be available. 

About Collectivity
 
COLLECT|IVITY
COLLECT|IVE 
COLLECT|ING 
COLLECT|ORS

1a space is pleased to announce “Collectivity”, a new series of events, including exhibitions, talks and other events for artists, collectors and the general public.

Collectivity builds on 1a’s origins and continuing status as an artist’s collective, working to support and promote the work of artists in Hong Kong.  We acknowledge the importance of collecting art as a means of enabling artists to earn a living and to support to the creation of new work.  Collectivity is an initiative aimed at creating a dialogue between artists, collectors and the institutions that support the art industry in Hong Kong.

Special thanks: Davina Lee

Locations: 

Art HK 2010
27-30 May (thu-sun)
Stand C1, Art HK 2010, Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition  Centre, 1 Expo Drive, Wanchai, Hong Kong.

1a space
22 May - 1 June  (sat-tue)
Unit 14, Cattle Depot Artist Village, 63 Ma Tau Kok Road, To Kwa Wan, Hong Kong.