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

challenge of reconciling their cultural origins with the relocation of their families in the South Pacific. For all the undoubted greatness and richness of Europe's artistic inheritance and traditions, and despite the fact that most New Zealanders are of European descent, that distant part of the world has come to seem increasingly less relevant to, and more remote from, the immediate purposes of contemporary art in New Zealand. The British historian and essayist Lord Macaulay, writing in 1840 (the year of the Treaty), imagined a distant time, 'when some traveller from New Zealand shall, in the midst of a vast solitude, take his stand on a broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's'. 3 A depiction of Macaulay's dream of the far future, with the tourist New Zealander upon the broken parapets contemplating something matching 'The glory that was Greece-the grandeur that was Rome', is among the illustrations in Gustave Dora's London (published in 1872). The hub of a once great empire had long since been abandoned. And from the centre of another world came a NewZealander-a Maori-to gaze upon the traces of a vanished civilisation. Jonathan Mane-Wheoki, Senior Lecturer,Art History, Universityof Canterbury, AotearoalNew Zealand 1 Although fifteen per cent of New Zealand's population is of Maori descent. five per cent are of Pacific Islands origin. Rangihiroa Panoho, 'Maori: At the centre, on the margins', in Headlands:Thinking Through NewZealandArt [exhibition catalogue], Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, Sydney, 1992, p.133. 3 Thomas Babington Macaulay, 'Von Ranke', in Critical andHistorical Essays II, Dent. London, 1907; reprint 1967, p.39. 30 I Es s AYS John Bevan Ford We share rainbows (from 'Te Aitanga akiwa series') (Descendents of an ancestor called Kiwa) 1995 Coloured pigmented ink on paper Networks Alison Carroll There are a number of uncomfortable zones in the visual arts world in Asia which are infrequently explored: the discomfort in Asian allegiances between the industrialised countries of North Asia -Japan, Korea, Taiwan-and the rest; the discomfort in South-East Asia between commercially successful art and curatorially praised art, and the distinct infrastructures which support each; and the old discomfort between traditional cultural worlds and internationalism. These are gaps in comfort, understanding and trust: gaps in the network. There are, however, existing and evolving networks in 'art in Asia'. In the old days, ten or fifteen years ago, the main network was that of the connoisseur of traditional collectables. The local, national and international collections were of these objects– fine, rare and special. The art magazines on Asian art available internationally-Oriental Art, Arts of Asia, Orientations-were either totally or predomi– nantly on traditional wares. Indeed, this network has remained and presumably will strongly continue. More recently, in the last five years, a force has emerged in most Asian countries which has gained a different international audience. New histories of the recent past of responses and reactions to local and international events by individual artists and groups in individual countries are becoming increasingly familiar through publications, exhibitions and conferences. These contemporary histories indicating complex allegiances, themes and issues across a variety of players in individual countries are clearly outlined nowadays for the outsider to read and understand. These networks have some cross-national threads, between ASEAN countries for example, and curators from various countries have increasingly developed projects that concern and include the art of their neighbours. Japanese and Australian curators have been more frequently seen in the region than ever before. After this, a third network is now becoming more clear. It is based on one of the uncomfortable zones in Asia and clearly remains problematic. This is the network of the internationalised curator: thinking through ideas, inviting representation and offering opportunities, or not. The international curatorial network challenges central tenets of 'Asian' culture. It does not respect tradition. It challenges status quos and accepted hierarchies. (They are given lipservice in the day to day, but no one is really fooled.) It is without clear cultural context. With new communications technology so available to individuals it can cross borders, and cultural niceties, without a qualm. Promotion of the nation and the national as a cohesive cultural unit is out. The individual is king, or queen. This is a Western cultural mode, based on the pattern of biennales, at Venice, Germany and the big American shows. The comments at the Kwangju Biennale in Korea in 1995 were about how Western that event was-Korea following Venice's lead. At Kwangju the discordances were clear between officialdom, with its special opening event for men in grey suits and girls wearing gloves, and the artistic practice on show-from the performance of Nam June Paik, to curators from Europe and artists from everywhere. The dynamic of these big shows forces individual artists to vie for their moment of attention. Nationalities are jumbled together. Often there is no clarity of position; no way for the audience to increase understanding as they follow the exhibition through. How long do the viewers stop, slowing down to read the label, stopping enough to watch three or four minutes of a video? They recall names afterwards, asking each other, which work stood out? There have even been arguments recently for lack of information or cultural context promoting a more interesting response, a 'fresh eye', as, for example, in the selection of Australian work by Japanese curators for a recent exhibition in Gifu. It could be argued that in the West, such Western modes can work-most of the audience understands most of the context. Indeed even Asian viewers of Western exhibitions have access to such nuances, very often having had Western art history as part of their education. But for Asia? How does the local audience understand such a foreign device, or the non-Asian audience understand art-if it is from Asian countries-from such different cultural positions? Surely, this is one of the clearest settings for cultural relevance and relativity; the strongest argument for post-modern issues of context. Obviously, this is written with the Queensland Art Gallery's Triennial in mind, where context has been clearly an issue throughout all processes, but which also seeks a way through these changing zones. In Asia, notably, the mode of the Triennial, while admired, is not copied. In art hierarchies the international curator remains most alluring. It is an area of change and challenge; uncomfortable. And a fourth network emerging seems to be adding to this discomfort. How does this individualised Western mode cohabit a world where economists and political watchers talk-and the cultural people of Asia nod in agree– ment-about the rise of the Asian cultural sphere? Especially the rise of the Chinese cultural sphere.