Beyond the Future: Papers from the Third Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art

NEW MODELS/NEW ART/NEW C ENTURY Al ison Carro l l 'Joi Bangla ! ' These words, 'Long Live Bangladesh !', were shouted by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and echoed by the crowd of 1 OOO when she opened the 8th Asian Biennale in Bangladesh in 1 997. It was clear the Prime Minister and the crowd wanted to make the event successful, in large part because it was theirs . It was an overt demonstration of one of the reasons why people host cultural events and why they place value on them . Contemporary art comes from artists' experiences, almost always based in a specific cultural space. Contemporary art events, unless on the web, are certainly space or place specific. Recognising this, and working to make sure such events remain relevant to their place, is essential to their success. And then all else can happen . As a psych iatrist once said, there are two main tasks for a parent in bringing up children : to give the child roots and to then set them free. I see contemporary art events in a similar way. My point today is to say contemporary art events can happen anywhere. They are not based on money, but they are based on desire. People have to want something to happen, and as someone has said , 'just do it'. Thirty-five countries took part in Dhaka in 1 997. A large open ing, and then a two-day conference with around 300 people. Discussion was lively, involved , self-critical, open , and very various. It opened up, for me literally, a whole new world. Not only Bhutan and Nepal and Bangladesh itself, but Oman and Qatar, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Georg ia, and Kyrghyzstan. Those debates were wonderful . I t was a little confronting, being the only Anglo there, t o hear the Iranian delegate tal k about 'the abyss of western culture'. He spoke about the 'mysticism of the eastern philosophy which shaped and was the base of that of the West' and how 'alas, this is no longer the case'. He said , 'A thorough review of the world today as far as Asian art is concerned takes us to the relationship between it and the newly born western philosophy and ideas: a relationship that has brought about the birth of a new phenomenon called modern art.' And so on . I quote this because the context it conjures is so different from ours here. And it made me think about that. It also made me think that such statements made in Dhaka, of course also part of an Islamic state, had a different resonance from here; or, indeed , from the Islamic show in Venice two years ago where those visual cultural statements just looked strange - not in their own place, nor fitting well within the new one. I'm including Bangladesh and these images for three reasons. F irst, as an example of a community committed to a project and taking it very seriously. Sec o nd, because it cost the Bangladeshis, I was told by the artistic director, $US30,000, to do it. Yes, around $50,000 Australian dollars total, com ing from UNESCO. But th ird because Bangladesh is in everyone's m inds the last place in the region to do something like this. The bottomless pit for aid money. The country with truly dreadful statistics for literacy and child workers and other awful facts for human existence. But they do do it. In 1 990 Suzanne Davies, a Board member of the Sydney Biennale, asked me to put forward a proposal for the 1 992 event based on Asian art. After due consideration , the whole Board decided the proposal before it would be inappropriate and, maybe, at that time, they were right. I reread that proposal in preparation for writing this, and it sounded okay. But, this was ten years ago, and that small organ isation in Sydney, and perhaps the mainstream art world, so dominant in Sydney, was unprepared to support such a venture in terms of interest, as well as money and infrastructure. The difference with Brisbane starting this Triennial at the same time was the commitment of a large institution to this scale of event, even prepared for it to be a mighty failure. Brisbane has fulfilled its desire according to what is possible in its place. As Bangladesh does . As Baguio, the small town in northern Luzon in the Philippines, does. There, a group of a rtists have come together fou r times to produce the Baguio Festival. The next one is this November, focusing on performance art. It's open to everyone: they invite around 500 artists 1 62