The exhibition showcases a total of fifty-two cartoon drawings. They portray auspicious wishes and blessings rooted in traditional Chinese culture. Created by our Director Yeung Chun Tong, the drawings are all illustrated in his latest book A Life Story of Mixed Emotions.

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Korean Cultural Center in Hong Kong(KCC) is pleased to present the second Media Art Project 2020 this year. KCC introduces the promising Korean media artists and their recent/main artworks throughout the year.

The artist of the month HAM Hyekyung, composes a personal narrative of ’someone’ by reconstructing ubiquitous images and stories the artist collected from various places. It does not portray a reliable protagonist or an excessive emotion, but rather makes a metaphor of a certain discomfort of reality, imperfection, and already ending (or has ended) situation unsure of when the ending approaches, out of discrepancy between video and narration or style of compiling existing narratives. Six video artworks are displayed at KCC that were taken in Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand, Canada and Korea.

AISHONANZUKA is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of Korean artist Yoon Hyup “WHILE YOU SLEEP”, which will be Yoon’s first solo exhibition in Hong Kong.

Yoon Hyup was born in South Korea in 1982, works and lives in New York. He is a self-taught painter and has been working since early 2000 with murals and live paintings. In his work, Yoon freely uses lines and dots to draw a minimalistic landscape from a unique perspective. Components of various cultures, he has experienced, are strongly reflected in his works. The rhythm & improvisation in music, the flexibility & radical perspective in street culture are some of the creative inputs that transform into lines, dots, “rhythms” and colors in his works. A combination of these elements powers the creation of unique abstract paintings.

This exhibition is a departure from the nature-themed paintings shown in the Summer 2020 group show, and focuses on Yoon’s other major image, the urban nightscape. In a series of four vertical canvas pieces (Sound of Friday 10, Slowly, Diamond Sky, Tomorrow) are a new attempt to connect different places with the concept of time.

In addition, we are pleased to announce his newly created character “Juggler”. The character, born from the image of a city where many people and things are mixed together, is created from the lines and dots that are characteristic of Yoon’s paintings, and it is a suitable expression to show the relationship between his paintings and the city. In recent years, his works have been installed in stores such as Dior and Tiffany & Co., and apparel in collaboration with NIKE and HUF has been released globally. The exhibition will start on February 6th. We look forward to seeing you at the exhibition.

It’s been over 2 years since we first introduced the captivating figure-based works by Akos Ezer and we are thoroughly enjoying following the development of his practice and the successful presentations he’s been lining up one after the other. After conquering Europe with his solo show in Paris last year, Hungarian artist is currently taking over Asia with a solo debut Let The Time Pass, over at AishoNanzuka in Hong Kong, on view until April 17th.

“I decided to stay positive and put my extra time and energy into new works, that helps me speed up time,” Ezer told us about a year ago when we checked with him for our Art in Uncertain Times series of features. And such sentiment is surely evident in Let The Time Pass, both through the title itself and the general atmosphere of the works. Featuring both paintings and sculpture, this coherent presentation is revolving around his signature subjects, mostly depicted bent and twisted in the moments of anticipation and solitude. Using their ludicrous postures as the metaphor for the human struggle to deal with both physical and psychical challenges of everyday reality, the artist is slowing things down with this particular body of work by including fewer group scenes or images capturing any dynamics.

Milan – Hong Kong design, new forms and functions in parallel with Italian iconic works are the outcomes of a year-long project (Design Made in Hong Kong 2020-2021 – www.designmadeinhongkong.com) that brought together two regions of the world, building parallelisms between their different design approaches and cultural backgrounds. Organized in three sections, the exhibits guide the visitors on a rich path, to meet multiple voices: from Italian designers – both Masters from the last century and young talents – to three Hong Kong design schools.

Italy is represented by three emerging designers – Federica Biasi, Federico Peri, and Sara Ricciardi – selected as representatives of the contemporary design scene through their recent productions and collaborations with brands, galleries, and institutions. Federica, Federico and Sara have very different design approaches: their works range from designing products to art direction for companies and projects, from research on materials and processes to collectible design projects for galleries and museums. They work for private clients, companies, and public institutions. The three of them are also very committed to teaching in design schools and sharing their experiences and knowledge with the next generations of designers. Emerging on the international scene and being so different from each other, they have been selected to have a dialogue with Hong Kong design students from the Universities partners of the project. They have been working around the themes explored by the students to develop a shared language between two places – Italy and Hong Kong – and two generations.

These three emerging designers are dialoguing with a selection of Italian Masters’ pieces from the 1970s to the 1990s, a period of great experimentation and turmoil – a great Italian design retrospective, reflecting a time of change that has several analogies with the current situation.

This period in Italy was a time for experimentation and research in terms of aesthetic language, materials and production processes, but was also a moment of exploration of the meanings and functions of interior decoration products. The designer collective which led the “postmodern movement” was Memphis, a groundbreaking group that innovated the sector using clashing colors, haphazard arrangements, and brightly colored plastic laminate. At the time, objects were usually designed to be functional, not decorative. Memphis revolutionized this with a more creative approach to design, where they poked fun at everyday objects by designing them in ways that were unusual.

The products shown in this exhibition are signed by the Italian design Masters: Aldo Cibic, Alessandro Mendini, Ettore Sottsass, Gaetano Pesce, Marco Zanini, Matteo Thun, and Michele De Lucchi. Their works have been selected because the historical periods they represent mirror our times. Both filled their masterpieces with similar provocative and experimental elements.

The third section is dedicated to the Hong Kong universities – School of Design, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University; Academy of Visual Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University, and Hong Kong Design Institute – showing the projects developed by the students as a result of an exchange of views between Europe and Asia, in the name of design: a common alphabet of great inspiration.

The objective of the project Design Made in Hong Kong was to build a platform between Hong Kong design students and emerging Italian designers. The goal was to share information, knowledge, and viewpoints to build a shared language that would contribute to both sides’ growth. Each school has developed a distinctive theme to reflect upon the current pandemic situation as the new normal. Students explore the aftermaths of the pandemic in terms of functions, aesthetics, and meanings of interior decoration.

The students from the Academy of Visual Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University tackle the complexity of the current situation by exploring alternative, more meaningful, and passionate ways of living. With the use of ceramic techniques, they create objects filled with joy and resilience in a time of fear and anxiety.

Students from the Hong Kong Design Institute were looking for human-centered solutions to these issues. The users’ struggles were identified, so that the furniture can be enhanced to aid communications, both among family members and with the external world. Their designs are built upon three different concepts: “The rise of vanishing space”, “Blurred boundary of work & living”, “The world is turning older”.

The students from School of Design, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University – start the discussion through case studies and envisioning future sustainable scenarios. Their exploration then deepens with furniture design and the use of engineered bamboo. The focus was people, cohabitation, and their relationship with space, environment, and its functions.

Following the previous exhibition “As Tea Goes By”, Touch Ceramics is proud to present “The Glimmer in Fluid — Teaware and Sakeware Group Exhibition” showcasing works from Hong Kong, Taiwanese and Japanese ceramic artists.

Both tea and sake constitute to our “fluid culture”. With Chinese tea and sake, the teawares and sakewares go beyond visual appreciation into a lush sensational feast of taste and aesthetics. Under the pandemic, we hope this exhibition lights up a glimmer of joy in our lives.

Different attitudes towards the philosophy of “fluid culture” lie beneath the works of the 18 artists; some artists only mold teawares, some only mold sakewares, while some are able to explore the relation between teaware and sakeware. Embedding cultures of the three territories, the shape, texture and shades all unfurl the richness in “fluid culture”, and further into the philosophies of the artists.

The exhibition will be divided in two parts. In part I we will present teawares and sakewares from Chung Wen Ting, Ogata Kamio, Tetsuya Ishiyama, Mika Sato, George Nakamura, Nagisa Shirai, Zhang Xi Yuan, Ray Chan and Zhang Yong Sheng. In part II we will feature works from Kazuhiro Katase, Kazunori Ohnaka, Chie Kajima, Lau Yat-wei, Chie Kobayashi, Takaya Fukuoka, Weng Shijie and Seiichiro Fujino.

To fully immerse in “fluid culture”, we also invite you to experience the special space. With specialty drinks (sake and tea) prepared by Season Li and Theresa, we hope that you will sit back and revel in the silence of inner peace. We also invite you to join our “fluid tour”, delving into the art of ceramics, tea and sake culture in 30 minutes.

Hong Kong Spotlight by Art Basel is a showcase of Hong Kong galleries who have participated in Art Basel’s Asian show. Organized in collaboration with Fine Art Asia, this unique platform is a united response to support and bring together the city’s arts community during these challenging times. The presentation comprised precisely curated projects, ranging from thematic solo and group exhibitions to art-historical showcases and film. With Hong Kong Spotlight, Art Basel’s first physical presentation in 2020, we are delighted to deliver an opportunity for art enthusiasts to come together, experience art, and exchange ideas.

A treat for gallery-hopping art lovers, the much anticipated South Side Art Day is back this year with collective openings, exhibitions and performances from HKAGA’s Southside member galleries on the 25th of April. Explore the diverse art spaces in Wong Chuk Hang and Tin Wan, and revel in the charm of Hong Kong’s rising art hub.

It has always been the hope of “Long March in Ink” to discuss Chinese ink outside of the medium, so we invited Vincent Mak Shing Fung and Season Lao to conduct interesting experiments on the subject of ink, and in the process, different art systems are birthed and more possibilities are developed. Mak’s work Grid of Life is an animated video depicting the rules of existence. Season Lao’s work Lotuses was exhibited at the Manchester Museum of Art in the United States, depicting the vitality of the lotus flower and expressing the coexistence between nature and human beings, as well as the various forms of life and death.
Both Tso Cheuk Yim and Michelle Fung Kuen Suet use printmaking to explore two different eras of ink painting. Tso’s The Swordsman seems to have transported himself to the Northern Wei Dynasty, using a fierce and square font to describe the aspirations and determination of a young literary man in the era of social conflict. Fung circles back and forth between the 1930s, 1940s and the future 2084 in her works, using the woodcut style to paint an urban propaganda for an imagined futuristic city. The reproducibility of the prints is a transcendent imagination that transcends time and space, connecting with the unique Chinese aesthetics that reveres “antiquity”.
Fung Hoi Shan and Qian Yin Xiao are all skilled in traditional ink painting. In The Jumper, Fung Hoi Shan depicts the knights in chess and uses osmosis to express the pattern of the chessboard. Qian Yin Xiao’s abstract paintings create different rhythms, such as light and heavy, fast and slow, by virtue of pure feeling and power. The elements of landscape painting are geometrically transformed into the textural abstract paintings Devour and Entangled.