Jaspar K.W. Lau's writing on PS trip 07

(revised, text only version)

Though Tobias asked me and others in the Curatorial Training Programme to write about the trip already in Istanbul before we parted, haven't really the time or the determination to write during the rest of the trip. After coming back, failed again to scramble up something quick for Jörg Heiser (German editor of Frieze magazine, author of Ploetzlich diese Uebersicht - was ist gute Kunst) who happened to be in town, for it was just few days before the HistoriCITY roundtable function. (In short, I don’t want to rush to write, in hope, that writing could be that other space to mediate what is not allowed or not possible, in the hectic everyday life, that which I have had enough these days.)

Missed that first deadline, I asked in a later meeting what style should we write in, for it is always crucial (for me at least) to know first what publication platform or target audience one is writing to and or addressing (though people tends to think otherwise of my writings, which is somehow true, for I write foremost to wrestle a space for oneself to think, the “thinking through writing” approach, and left it for editors to decide the rest.) Gladly to hear, Tobias suggested we start with the most causal kind of writing as that of writing in yr own blog. I took it literally and this is what you are seeing here in my blog now. (For the readers of my blog, I readily assume them to know better the way I think and write, and could be little more patient with me.)

In my first draft for Heiser, I started then with a larger picture, for I thought I could easily get lost in the details with so much that I have seen on the trip, but with actually not much big idea or strong opinion about the things I saw. I might like to mention one work seen here, recorded an observation there, the only constant thought running through is excitement (new places) as much as fatigue (more art). Most of the materials (particularly the written ones) I gathered, I have not digested yet. But am I thus cheating? Wanting to be more informed (or playing it safe by taking in others’ opinion first), rather than pronouncing my instinctive (if not rushed) judgement?

(Take for example, the roundtable at Platform in Istanbul, just days after the opening of the Istanbul Biennial Hou Han-ru curated. Tobias speaked up then, against a round of negative views on the Biennial, which are pretty unfounded. That certainly left me a strong impression, of how a quick confident judgment with a certain degree of articulation is crucial in the, let's say, business/trade of curating. (Hope I could upload a CLIP here later.) But as always, I do not like to talk, as my mind always could not work fast enough, and lack of confident of what I could therefore offer.)
And I am actually as much impressed, when after revisiting the few exhibitions in the biennial (actually we revisited the World Market venue right after the Platform roundtable, so Tobias somehow speak before he really covered the whole show!), Tobias could frankly allow himself a certain degree of adjustment in his view, thinking that the show might not be as great as his first praised (in the first few days there). Yet could one writes on one thing and add in a second opinion, then a third …? And retain them all in one single article?)

This is how I originally started this article:

First it was the Venice-Basel-Kassel-Munster (aka Grand Tour), then the Istanbul-Lyon-Athens (aka floating territories) follow. The meaning of the Europa Grand Tour has changed with these "Transbiennial"s. No longer to visit the heritage (however much in ruins), but biennials one after the other. If it is the linkage to what kind of heritage that decided who we are, no wonder, we recognized ourselves as the “Contemporary”, with an insatiable pursuit of the latest? (But maybe equally in ruins?)

But then last week, picking up the Sept issue of Art Forum from Para/Site,as I was reading Okwui Enwezor’s “History Lessons,” I discovered that the author has lend a similar strategy and topic to begin his article:

… the so-called Grand Tour – an anachronistic label for this year’s trio of shows that, in truth, only hints at the level of dehistoricization at which contemporary art field is currently operating …

[Maybe more on Enzewor's dehistoricization later, for it seems quite a contrary consider the art "about" social political issues in Venice, Istanbul and also Lyon Biennial that look back at the past decade. For me, the dehistoricization is more in tune with Paul Virilio's "contempoary art, sure, but contemporary with what?" as he put it in Art and Fear. In a different context, Julian Stallabrass mentioned about the eclecticism of contemporary art as a tradition of rupture, hence a tradition simultaneously historical and dehistoricized. But maybe dehistoricization is not a right angle, for Lyon Biennial has the theme of looking back at the past decade? Or it actually enhance the dehistoricization, at least in breaking down one historical narrative to (curators-artists) molecules.]

He also argued, that “of all the exhibitions this summer, Documenta 12 is the only one that invites us to take a shot at it – impelling us to reject it, to quarrel with it, to debate the purpose of an exhibition as an aesthetic and intellectual experience.”

I am not sure if he has seen Istanbul, Athens and or Lyon biennials before he wrote the article [As matter of facts, he has contributed both to the catalogue of IB07 and LB07 with his essays], but I personally find no personal urge to write about these shows that I saw in the trip. (Pity though, it was not so much because I learnt to appreciate the art in silence.) Or even Documenta (which I have been writing for the past few times), if just for its “argument” sake?

Why is that? Does it owe to the formulation of the exhibitions, or is it just my fault? Seeing people writing on them, the problem must be within myself. But how is one (who is not certain wanting to make up opinion) to write on them? The only way I felt I could proceed, is really to pose questions, then further questions. I feel I need to write in a form that of plainly questions.

Just as I told my friends, that since I have no lessons from the curatorial training programme before I visited these exhibitions, I have not with me any new tools/special perspective to see them other than in the way I used to. But I joined in this programme partly because I felt exhausted with my previous arbitrary (hence inexhaustible) way of writing (that’s also why I am feed up with it). Seeing more obviously did not help. I am even a bit bored by them, or felt the biennials becoming rotten (mainly because of the opening parties nights after nights?).

So I rather turn back to the basics here. (but what is actually the basics? other than unanswered, or even unformulated questions?)

To begin with. What is to comment, to write about? (Are we really (bounded to) having so much opinions?) Over the years, I became doubtful who really cares about your personal opinion? Especially when there are no rigorously argument within that people could build on. How is it possible to see things more objectively for a change, in a more professional (occupational?) manner? Or that our raised discussion about curating could actually help shape the language and discourse over this (still relatively young?) profession/trade of curating? (But I feel this trade is old, too old already. Particularly with the death of Harald Szeemann. Being too much institutionalized, the PSCTP course itself, a sign that it has entered into a self-reproduction phrase. Well put in the bk Questions of Practice: What Makes A Great Exhibition?: “given the on going, not entirely unproblematic professionalization”.

What I am interested in (problem I have to tackle in the very first place), of this phenomenon of seeing art, visiting biennials, is perhaps how an audience is supposed to response, and not just to one show, but a train of them! How is one to discuss about one singular biennial? Judging a biennial being “outstanding” perhaps implies already the need to compare (and not just the shows happening around the same time, but also it predecessors). Or should we treat each of them as unique, as if a work of art by itself?
(What is this idea of comparison anyway? Must there be at least something in common to begin with? The same curator in different exhibition contexts? The same work in different shows? The same theme in different works or shows? …)

Very often, these comparison between biennials are portrayed as competition (aesthetically?), but the “grand tour” arrangement has already demonstrated it otherwise (cultural tourism wise!). Could it be coming close to that, it is the comparison or competition in the visitors’ mind, which make the individual shows (the single trip) all the more interesting. So the assessing of one show is really by the comparison of it with another? hence an excuse for ever more travelling?

I do think that since shows happened one after another within a short span of time, they do might share a similar global context which make a comparison between them seems valid. {Take for example, the works dealing with the theme of war in Storr's VB07 and the thematic treatment on gobal warfare in Hou's IB07.} While comparison with previous biennials make sense with the local context, venues selection etc. {Take for example, the character of Arsenale in various VBs, the choice of venues in Documentas, Istanbul obviously} Yet, as the global and local context are certainly interwined, and so together they inevitably redirected our attention to the curator’s vision (What to focus) being the key again?)

(Yet since a biennial will soon be in another curator’s hand, or these institutions as big as Documenta or Venice Biennial could, no matter what, have things their ways, in the end, it is mostly the reputation of the curator which is more at stake? With the curatorial frameworks inevitably being the focus of comparison?) Considering the sheer scale of biennials, are we inevitably looking and apprehending the curatorship, or is it still the addition of “outstanding” singular work(s) that decide on the quality of a show.
What is then this idea of “coherence” in a show? Why is coherence important? Maybe it is really all about the “persuasiveness of the curatorial discourse”?
It is somehow not hard to present works which form a seemingly coherence, at least on a surface level. So what's the difference between having a curatorial contextual wrapping and turning works into merely curatorial illustrations?

I am not trying to criticize the development, the scale of biennials, at least not here (many has been commenting on this already, see for example BIENNIAL CULTURE by Jerry Saltz), but this condition of mobility, inevitably remind me to think of what kind of tourist and traveler am I? [I remember a very vivid metaphor, that the privileged class of people appearing in biennials are like the thin spread of oil split on water …] If as some has argued, that artists should not be air-borne, I don't see why viewers could still do so? I thought I am worst than the tourists lining up in front of the museum in Venice San Marco (despite I have been to Venice for so many times, I still have no time to visit it, and yet I hint at Ruskin’s Stone of Venice with my article for Para/Site Venice Biennial Collective, maybe however to address similarly our own shallowness in culture cultivation). Or those on the grand tour in the past, those eager to embrace their heritage. Ours is so much more a kind of instant consumption, taking everything in without real digestion. No wonder we are the “Visual” arts.

Earlier, I read Lam Wai Kit’s photo essay in Muse magazine of her trip in Venice. And interestingly, Lam took quite a few shots, not of the touristic city or sights, but that of the tourists (as if trying to stand apart from them?). Of course, to my disappointment, its text describing the Hong Kong Pavilion in Venice is just like taken straight out from the press release. But to be honest, if I have to write on the HK Pavilion (ofcourse a PC incorrect term), I don’t think I could fair any better. To me, Amy Cheung’s work has stopped functioning (at least on the days we were there) or the collapsed tent of Cao Fei in the China Pavilion (btw, also curated by Hou Hanru) as I posted here earlier in the blog, could be the only kind of things I particularly like to raise, for that is the truth of reality. And you do not need any aesthetic judgment to see the “hypocrisy” at sake, but these news were never getting any coverage.

(I really wonder why, for example, I heard no one connecting them with Ai Wei Wei's collapsed work in Documenta as pronouncing the same phenomenon, if not a symptom? Simply because we are not travelling with Cao Fei to the next opening somewhere in the world, seeing her first in Istanbul then performing again live in Lyon for the opening preview, but travelling in a wrong direction and being too late arriving at Venice that is to blame?)

(Part II)

Don't take me wrong for my last entry, I am still very much interested in following the discussion/debate (alas, writings on shows, rather than shows) in assessing the various shows this summer, particularly the reception of seemingly "disastrous" Documenta (which was not included in this ps trip might already be a noteworthy point?) [Interestingly, Documenta, seems to prefer seeking people outside of the already well-known mainstream curators in the present biennial circuit. Enzewor's Johannesburg biennale might be one tiny exception. As the so-called most important art exhibition around the world, let's see if the coming one will yield to this, owe to the "failure" pressure of this last one?)

So far, much has been said between Storr (07VB) and Buergel (07 D11), but Hou (07IB) and Obrist (07LyonB, herefater LB) could be another interesting pair, especially considering their previous partnership on various occassions. (I do hope I could touch on that a bit later on.) But despite Francesco Bonami frequently jumps between comparing Storr's VB with Buergel Documenta 11 in his contribution to ArtForum, his major critique of Storr is fundamentally circling around the question of:

What a Biennial is (supposingly)? What curating VB is really about?

To him: "a truly contemporary show must be about challenges, discovery, failure – the moment".– Francesco Bonami, "Isolated Incident," ArtForum, Sept 2007, p. 396.

and in his eyes, Storr, as the "museum-trained" curator, failed to recognize the unique character of a biennial and particularly that of the VB.

But wasn't that (view of Bonami) a kind of fixed expectation (of Biennial) as well? Robert Storr's uncompromising speech in his catalogue essay, of "proceed on the faith," in want of "breaking the public of its habit of rapidly consuming images," claiming that "nor are biennials for people in a hurry," could actually be posing another kind of "challenges," and risking oneself becoming a "failure" too. (If risk and failure is really so important to biennial and curating.)

The failure of Storr, to me, was however not in Arsenale, despite Jorg Heiser too, has also very similar complaint as Jerry Saltz, that "In the Arsenale, Storr adopts a gambit I call 'Curator As Anchorman.' Here, a curator in effect says, 'Whenever there's a problem in the world, I'll be there."

For me, I guess the failure happened in the Italian Pavilion in Gardini (which might be too close to being a museum space that it laid a trap for Storr). As usual, the exhibits were a mix of good and bad works, but with Sigmar Polke's huge painting occupying the central foyer, and the dead artists above in the attic, the usage of these strategical positions seems to have betrayed the kind of "emerging patterns" and falling back to the "epiphanies" in his catalogue essay of "Think with the Sense – Feel with the Mind. Art in the Present Tense." As critic Jerry Saltz puts it earlier on, with all the A-listers artists, it exemplifies that "this Biennale is Storr's résumé", but unfortunately "brilliant errors are missing here."

So what is risk?

Creating a show in which nothing could fail was, to Szeemann, a waste of time.
- David Levi Strauss, in Curating in Cautionary Tales: Critical Curating, p.24.

[Again I am getting back to the wonderful article by David Levi Strauss, “The Bias of the World: Curating after Szeemann & Hopps” in Curating in Cautionary Tales: Critical Curating, which Levi-Strauss sums up the charisma of Szeemann as: “An image of the curator as a free agent, capable of almost anything.” How could that not be appealing?) But another point that that article is relevant to me is what I like to develop later here in Part 3, that is:

For better or worse, curators of contemporary art have become, especially in the last ten years, the principal representatives of some of our most persistent questions and confusions about the social role of art.
(Is art a force for change and renewal, or is it a commodity, for advantage or convenience? Is art a radical activity, undermining social conventions, or is it diverting entertainment for the wealthy? Are artists the antennae of human race, or are they spoiled children with delusions of grandeur … ? Are art exhibitions “spiritual undertakings with the power to conjure alternative ways of organizing society,” or vehicles for cultural tourism and nationalistic propaganda?)

I will try to line up more failures here below (but perhaps failure owe to a lack of risk?), the major ones that I felt over the other two biennials (IB07 & LB07), not that I believe they are valid critiques in any ways, but maybe as some fulfilled duties, so that I could move on back to the “basic” (questions) that I wanted to write as my part 3.]

For LB07
Obrist failed to come up with (at least from himself) any substantial statements. (wasn't the earlier show in 1a Space "handover/talkover" doing the same thing? wasn't "handover/talkover" being criticized for the same thing? (issue of artist as curator/"sub-curating" as Jeff puts it/artists picking artists.../role of curators)
For the art that Obrist picked, it seems he is not shy from showing a pretty narrow taste of aesthetics, unified, yet remained quite Euro(?)centric. Is it a problem? I don’t know.

For IB07
Hou failed in many contradictory ways. The major one to me is how "Burn it or Not" and "World Factory" is more sucessful than the proper art venue of "Entre-polis" in curatorial sense, but Xu Zhen occupying such a signifcant place in "Burn it or Not" ruins the whole show there, while "World Factory" is a prefabricated series moving in from San Francisco, and proved too packed to do justice to the works. "Entre-polis" without a insitu context is perhaps the weakest in comparison, and hence not much optimism seems to be coming out from this "dream factory".


(more coming soon)

Activities (constant update)

Trip 07
Istanbul Biennial /Istanbul
De Appel / Amsterdam
Einhoven
Sittard
Rotterdam
Lyon Biennial
Venice Biennial
Paris
Shenzhen


Meeting in Hong Kong

Jorg Heiser, editor of Frieze magazine
Francois Piron, French curator
Vanessa McRae, Exhibitions Manager, IMA Brisbane
Stephen Eastaugh, Australia artist
AES+F, Russian art collective
Jen Brand, Germany Artist
Lee Weng Choy, Singapore
Birgit Hopfener

Pamela Kember, Art school
Samantha Culp, Embassy Projects
Hiram To, artist and curator
Leung Chi Wo, artist and curator
Kurt Chan Yuk Keung, artist, CU Fine Arts
Linda Lai, City U
Yeung Yang, writer and curator
John Batten, gallery owner
Kith Tsang, artist and curator
Map Office, artists

Functions
Openings
Pamela Kember's students with Tobias Berger

P.S.A.S.H.K.J.C.C.P.T.

Para/Site Art Space and Hong Kong Jockey Club
Curatorial Training Programme 2007

This seven-month course (September 2007 to April 2008) will introduce the participants to the state of today's international contemporary art, enabling them to navigate the art world confidently and realize exciting and high quality exhibitions in the future.

Hong Kong is the main base of the CP with a focus on the Pearl River Delta and Mainland China. Apart from having a vibrant art scene, Hong Kong is also the commercial center of Asian Contemporary art as major auction houses choose the city as a their base along with important galleries and consultants. The Pearl River Delta is a burgeoning area with plenty to offer in contemporary art, hosting the Guangdong Triennial, Architecture Biennial and the Ink Biennial as well as home for many established artists such as Cao Fei, Zheng Guo Gu and Lin Yi Lin. It is also where important institutions like Macao Museum of Art (Macau), Guangdong Museum of Art (Guangzhou) and He Xiang Ning Art Museum (Shenzhen) are located. Besides Para/Site Art Space there are several other independent art spaces in the region, for example 1A Space, Videotage and the Art Center in Hong Kong, OCAT in Shenzhen ) and our partner institution Vitamin Creative Space in Guangzhou.

The main goal of the CPP is to use the Pearl River Delta as a case study for the participants to build their own networks, to analyse and understand the structure, artistic environment and the function of different institutions within the region. This knowledge could be extended to better understand the current contemporary art world and to position local art in an international art environment and critical discourse of the current local environment.

The seven-month full-time project will be composed of group seminars, artist meetings, visits and short overseas excursions to museums and galleries. Participants of the project are also required to work on independent research or curatorial projects and participate in Para/Site Art Space's daily operation. At the end of the course, the four participants will produce a major exhibition, which they would develop together in the duration of the programme.

PARA/SITE ART SPACE
Para/Site Art Space is Hong Kong's leading visual-arts organization. Its focus is to produce, exhibit and communicate high-quality local and international contemporary art. Founded in 1996, it is the city's first non-profit independent organization that actively supports the professional development of contemporary art and discourses in Hong Kong and overseas. Over the past eleven years, Para/Site Art Space has produced and presented over 100 exhibitions, consisting mainly of solo, thematic and artist-curated exhibitions and participated in the international biennials in Venice and Gwangju. It has also produced numerous catalogues, touring exhibitions, and held a wide range of workshops and seminars. Since 2005 a full time curator, Tobias Berger, directs Para/Site Art Space.

Partner Institutions and Programmes
The course is embedded in an international network of organizations that will actively help in the development, training and communication of the course. The participants of the course will study together with key figures of these institutions and programmes to exchange ideas and experiences regularly.
- De Appel Curatorial Training Programme, Amsterdam
- Inspire Fellowship Programme , London
- Vitamin Creative Space, Guangzhou

Learn
With the emergence of new models of art spaces and exhibition formats means that the role of a curator is constantly in flux. The course will discuss the how art is being curated under various particular spatial, exhibition frameworks and the different roles an institutional and a freelance curator play in the contemporary art world. The participants will also learn the historical development and concepts in both Chinese and International art. The course will concentrate on International and Chinese Contemporary Art, bridging general concepts, themes and theoretical issues to explore the way we look at art in the context of contemporary society and culture.

Working closely with our partner institutions, overseas curators, art historians and artists would be invited to conduct small group seminars with the participants. Para/Site Art Space has been active in organizing talks and in the past two years, we have organized or co-presented talks with people, among others, Hedwig Fijen, Ute Meta Bauer, Nicolaus Schafhausen, Wolf Herzogenrath, Yilmaz Dziewor, Ruth Noack, Doryun Chong, Noritoshi Hiragawa, Lawrence Weiner, Cao Fei, Paul Chan, Shu Yang together with discussions about curating, the art market and the future of Hong Kong's art spaces.

Curate
The course will concentrate on the curating of contemporary visual art. Besides regular meetings with international curators, it will discuss different methods of curating, the particularities of the various art-institutions along with the challenges of independent curating. The participants will be actively involved in running the program of Para/Site Art Space. During the course they will curate small individual projects and gain hands-on experience in the exhibition making process. At the end of the course, the participants will curate an exhibition project in a large Hong Kong art space and publish a catalogue.

Meet
To build up a network with professionals and learn the different positions of contemporary art world, it is essential to be exposed to a variety of experts in the arts. The aim is it to meet and discuss with a wide range of local and international artists, curators, theorists, gallerists, architects, museum administrators and other art professionals. In these concentrated informal meetings and encounters, the participants will have the chance to make contacts, get first hand knowledge of the art world and gain experiences that will be useful in further developing their professional career.

Travel
The participants will be "On the road" most of the time. They will have a chance to meet professionals in their work environment. This will enable the participants to learn to critically analyze the artistic ecologies in the area, especially in the Pearl River Delta, with its various social, cultural and institutional contexts. An excursion to a major international art event is also planed to give the participants the possibility to see, analyse and learn in a more international context.

Write
Besides active curating, writing is an important conduit to reflect and reach out to the public. Writing and editing are also essential skills needed for exhibition making. The meditation of art is one of the most challenging parts of contemporary art. The participants will be asked to write press releases, curatorial statements, articles and short explanations . The participants would further develop their writing skills in the duration of the course through workshops and group discussions on art criticism and writing with Chinese and English art editors and frequent writing assignments.

Budget
The participants are not only responsible for the budgeting of their own exhibition but will be introduced to budget forecasting, event budgeting and how to successfully write fundraising and sponsorship applications. They are expected to raise additional funds for their final exhibition if necessary.

Programme Coordinators
Tobias Berger studied art history and economics at Bochum University and has completed the De Appel Curatorial Training Programme in Amsterdam before working for three years as curator at the Museum Fridericianum in Kassel. In 2002 he was the artistic director of the 8th Baltic Triennial of International Art in Vilnius and from 2003 until 2005, the director of ARTSPACE in Auckland. In 2004 he was the commissioner for the New Zealand participation at the Sao Paulo Bienal. He was also involved in international Biennial projects in Christchurch, Gwangju, Auckland and Busan. Since April 2005 he is the executive director and curator at Para/Site Art Space in Hong Kong. He has curated over 60 projects and has published internationally.

Christina Li graduated from the University of Hong Kong with a degree in Fine Arts and Comparative Literature. She has been working as the Assistant Curator at Para/Site Art Space since 2005 and has worked extensively with artists in the Pearl River Delta region.

Partner Institutions:
De Appel Curatorial Training Programme, Amsterdam
de Appel is a contemporary Arts Centre, located in the heart of Amsterdam. Over the 25 years of its existence it has been operating on an international level and for 10 years de Appel has been running a renowned Curatorial Training Programme. Initiated in 1994, the course wishes to offer young curators a condensed package of experiences and skills that can be used as tools and instruments during the further development of their professional career.

Inspire Fellowship Programme, London
The Inspire Fellowship Programme proposes an integrated approach to curatorial training, drawing on the professional realities of the field and also providing more conventionally academic training. The Fellows are actively involved in the shaping as well as the delivery of the programme throughout and are expected to be competent and confident professional operators in the arts at the end of their two-year fellowship together with major art museums and art institutions in London. The Fellowship Programme has been devised by Arts Council England, London.

Vitamin Creative Space, Guangzhou
Founded by Hu Fang and Zhang Wei, Vitamin Creative Space based in Guangzhou, is the first alternative art space in Pearl River Delta. It dedicates itself to contemporary art-exchange, analysing and combining different forms of contemporary cultures. Other than curating exhibitions in the space, they produce publications and are involved in curating exhibitions at international art fairs and museums such as Liste 06, Frieze Art Fair 2006, Het Domein (Holland) and recently Singapore Bienniale 2006.