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

examination of art from across the region by writers in the region. Sabapathy argues that greater exchanges of art works across the region will increase and enhance both the critical process and public appreciation of the 'art and ideas in the region'. Asian shell-Asian kernel? An exciting prospect. While I have no doubt about the successful development of this new language by Asian artists and commentators, I rather wonder how Australia will develop. I was interested to read a review in early 1996 by Sasha Grishin where, in talking about Aboriginal art, he says: Some of this work is brilliant, the rest left me feeling uncomfortable. I feel there are too many barriers for a white critic to advance a balanced evaluation.There is an urgent need for Koori artists, curators and critics to create a language within which an assessment is possible. My own feeling for some time has been that Aboriginal art will only achieve its autonomy when Aboriginal artists own their imagery, own their marketing outlets and own their critical discourse. 1 (my emphasis) Given a wider appreciation of the arts of the region, the substantial pressures from the growing Asian and Pacific communities amongst our multicultural faces and the accumulated debt to our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, how will 'Australian art' look by the turn of the century.What language will it use? NeilManton,Art Consultant and Writer 1 SashaGrishin, 'Modern Masters', The CanberraTimes, 27 March1996. AHT 'WOHKS NEVBH. EXIST IN TIMB ,'I'HEY HAVB "ENTHY POINTS" 11 .. I I i !, 32 I Es sAvs Redza Piyadasa Entry points 1978 Assemblage Bridging the East-West Divide: AChallenge for Curators Anne Kirker When Paul Keating announced at an 'Into Asia' trade and investment convention in Perth (17 November 1992), that 'Australia can no longer afford to be a society located with its geographical feet in Asia, but with its intellectual head and emotional heart in Europe or North America', he was obviously chiefly concerned with economic matters. Nevertheless, statements such as this have reverberated throughout the entire political and social fabric of this country during the 1990s and confirmed shifts in the Australian mindset which have been evolving for much longer. In terms of artistic matters, Alison Broinowski has described in her comprehensive book The Yellow Lady: Australian Impressions ofAsia (incidentally published the same year), an attraction to Asian cultures by Australian artists and writers which has occurred in various ways for over a century. Aside from aesthetic influences on creative talent here, which the writer describes, there has also been an increase in the exchange of artists, exhibitions and the like between that vast geographical region known as 'Asia' and this continent. Influences have become mutual with stylistic and conceptual impulses being sparked equally between a number of Australians and members of communities in the Asia-Pacific region. Rather than a simple 'two-way street' between East and West, the situation can now be compared to 'an artistic freeway', with multiple entry points and exits. 1 Asian cities are likely to be as familiar to Australian-based curators on research trips as say New York, Zurich or London. And Japanese and Indonesian as much as French and German are part of the assumed (or at least aspired to) 'second' languages.There is still the tug of the old with the pull of the new, a tension between orthodox, time– honoured allegiances and those fresh avenues which offer intellectual growth and personal devel– opment. Yet it is that grappling with the old and the new, between the known and unknown, and the acceptance of the phrase 'Australia and the Asia– Pacific' as a guiding principle, which provides the greatest challenge for the curator in Australia today. The presence of the old can be commonly traced in Australia and its immediate neighbourhood. From the early twentieth century, European teachers, and those trained in England, France, Italy and elsewhere, have brought to art schools in the Asia-Pacific region, Western models of creative expression, albeit often at the expense of indigenous forms. Colonising activity in the past by Western powers has sometimes resulted in links between particular countries being informally rearticulated to the advantage of both parties. This is a positive offshoot of post-colonialism. In the visual arts, the trend is apparent through university post-graduate study programs, residencies for artists, and exhibi- tion opportunities. For instance, many contemporary Indian painters have studied and exhibited in England, and artists and art administrators from The Philippines have often furthered their training in the United States. It is the latter country that has particularly been a focus for South-East Asian art professionals in the 1960s through to the 1980s. Now Australia is rapidly providing opportunities for education abroad, work and exhibition experience. With the pull of the new, the curatorial brief has expanded for Australians who are discovering in their contact with Asia, a liberating alternative to European ideals. The challenge in addressing new orders is not to dismiss the old art histories and professional contacts, but to incorporate them into a broader and ultimately more enriching pool of knowledge.This development does not extend in a linear fashion but traverses an infinite number of paths by which to explore the multidimensional nature of contemporary art practice. It does not dismiss the tradition of art emanating from Europe or North America but places it in perspective with the particularities of societies thriving outside the immediate sphere of influence of these two powers. Curators would find it impossible to fully interpret twentieth-century developments in the art practice of Asian cultures without a thorough knowledge of Western art histories. For instance, without an ap– preciation of the influential School of Paris (Matisse et al.), how can one describe the paintings and drawings of Vietnamese artists working out of Hanoi? Given the former situation of French occupation in Vietnam, how can one not take the impact of this into account when assessing the art practice of that country? Western knowledge has wide currency, yet with the environment which we (the Australian curator) term with deceptive simplicity 'Asia', a multitude of specific local customs and modes of perception must now be faced. Curators are com– pelled to not only address the broad issues of the East-West divide but explore this specificity (which they are accustomed to do with European cultures). Additionally, there is the necessity to be aware of a fruitful interaction which has and continues to occur within Asian cultures themselves, thus further extending the metaphor of the 'artistic freeway'. Two examples from South-East Asia, case studies if you like, elaborate this intertwining of East and West.The observations pertain to Thailand and The Philippines and have resulted from a curatorial involvement with both these countries through the Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art program. Thailand and The Philippines are distinctly different cultures from each other, sharing no parallel histories or social customs. It takes just over three hours to fly between Bangkok and Manila yet the 'culture shock' of adjusting from one to the other is as immense as that of Paris and Moscow, of a similar geographical distance apart.