The Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art exhibition catalogue (APT2)

In this film the standardised post-colonial dreams of elsewhere are reinterpreted with a twist. Wong Kar-Wai uses inanimate objects as symbols of his characters' yearnings for the false promises of elsewhere. Familiar images like over-stuffed Garfield dolls and accustomed soundtracks are employed as the synthetic signposts that temporarily divert the characters' attentions from the congested spaces of their lives. These cues for unrealisable desires for elsewhere are signposts suggesting that real culture and real lives lie somewhere else. Hong Kong's traditional role as 'the meeting place between East and West' 4 doubly dooms it as a kind of perpetual purgatory of longing for the Other, yet in this film, that traditional identification of Hong Kong is indefinitely suspended as the characters become enmeshed in the labyrinth of their own lives. In the narrow warrens of Hong Kong's urban jungle, in the steamy sweatshops and bed spacers and cramped fast food kitchens, sheer proximity forces the characters into unlikely relationships and roles. And the fact that there seems to be no middle distance for critical speculation allows those roles of doubling and double-dealing and transformation to be temporarily invisible to the characters whose lives and identities are continually compelled to change. It is Wong Kar-Wai's particular use of space -as congestion and over-layering and claustro– phobia-that allows the film to develop the qualities that suggest that, here in this space, mimicry is infused with a knowingness. The 'made in Hong Kong' label that once signified poor quality copies now suggests quick-witted, critically informed and resistant appropriations. And so it is with so much of the contemporary art practices of this region, which have, until recently, repeatedly been misinterpreted by art historians and cultural critics as second-rate emulations of styles from elsewhere. Such ill-informed attempts to frame the cultural production of the diverse cultures of this region within the terms and frameworks of United States modernism are evidence of the ongoing tendencies of cultural imperialism. This is not to argue that such influences have not had profound effects; there can be little doubt that international capitalism and its accompanying aesthetic styles, codes and genres have deeply influenced many contemporary artists and movements in the Asia-Pacific region. However, the specific contexts and the particular terms through which such influences were (and are) received have repeatedly been overlooked in most art historical accounts. Instead, these histories tend to accept the terms of modernism uncritically, and so in turn misunderstand not only the critical resistance of 'peripheral' cultures to overseas influences, but also overlook the important roles that specific communities and contexts play in reinterpreting received styles and ideas to fit different communities and contexts. Any closer inspection of the cultural forms that lie beneath the thin 'epidermis' of modernist formal elements reveals the wealth of references to specific contexts and histories that make the cultural production of this region so rich. Part of the value of exhibitions like the Asia-Pacific Triennial lies not so much in demonstrating what we have in common across the cultural diversity of the region, but rather, in the opportunity such exhibitions give for seeking out the often subtle differences between what appears at surface-level to be shared commonalities. These 'glitches', irregularities or divergences from established frameworks of identity often reveal cultural refusals to conform to either tradition or to change. But such cultural 'misfits' are often the seeds of new directions and unforseen tendencies. In a sense, exhibitions such as the Asia-Pacific Triennial can offer a forum for participation in history in the re-making; a site where past assumptions can be challenged by new dialogues across national and regional boundaries. However, in order to do this effectively, it seems important to proceed as though our individual understandings of 'international' or 'universal' or 'theoretical' terminology may not hold true within another region, or even within an altered context. This is time best used in creating new bases and frameworks for a more contextually relevant understanding of the various cultural developments in the region. It seems that, in particular, this exhibition offers a site where we can listen and look carefully at what may superficially appear to be 'mistranslations' of established styles and ideas, and to search for those irregularities and inconsistencies that do not seem to fit within more traditional canons. In an age of steadily encroaching homogeneity, it may be that the ability to persist as a 'misfit' is evidence of a strong, independent cultural refusal to be suffocated beneath the thin skin of internationalism. Pat Hoffie, Artist, Writer and Associate Professor, Queensland College of Art, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. 1 Jean-Fran~ois Lyotard, The Post-Modern Condition:AReport on Knowledge, trans.G.Bennington and B.Massumi,Manchester University Press, Manchester,1979 2 vaclav Havel, 'The politics of responsibility'. WorldPolicyJournal vol.XII,no.3, Autumn 1995, p.81. (The essay was adapted from the commencement address given at Harvard University,8June, 1995.) 3 Umberto Eco, li"avels in Hyperreality, trans. W. Weaver, Pan Books in association with Secker & Warburg,London,1987. 'Such acharacterisation of Hong Kong is byno means unique to an enormously widespread cliche, and one which manages to deny anyseparate identity to the colony, to reduce it to a"gateway" or "bridge",through or over which Chinese or Western influences pass'. David Clarke, 'BetweenEast and West. Negotiations with tradition and modernity in Hong Kong art', Third Text, 28/29, Autumn/Winter 1994, p.81. Top Heri Dono Makan pelor (Eating bullets) 1992 Synthetic polymer paint and collage on paper 66x77cm Collection: Queensland Art Gallery. Queensland Art Gallery Foundation Bottom Kung Hei Fat Choi 1996 Hong Kong ESSAYS 25