The Fourth Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art

FORKING TONGUES As far as the history of the APT is concerned, it happened at a moment when Australia opened a window to its future in the region. That window has since been shut and bolted. A diplomat friend tells me it will take 40 years to regain that position. The spiritual trust is no longer there. Australia is in fact seen as socially dysfunctional in the region. Having said all that, I'm not advocating gloom about the APT, but persistence in the face of change. In other words, it is important to hold to the navigating points the APT provided back in 1993, precisely because things have changed. There are people other than those in government who can generate progressive ideas about the region . Hetti Most Australians would find it easier to name the countries in Europe than those in the Pacific - or any Aboriginal nations, for that matter. Certainly, art from the Pacific has yet to achieve a significant presence in our public collections. There are other weird terms we can chuck into the mix: East, West and European. Especially when these terms are applied in Australia, I get a sense of how dislocated and, as Brian says, socially dysfunctional Australia must appear to the rest of the world. I cringe to think of the impression the Tampa affair creates; 4 and, because I was overseas at the time, I know how outraged the international media were over the Stolen Generations and their treatment - then and now - by Australian governments. 5 Yet, as Brian says, it is probably more important than ever to attempt to maintain, revive or initiate those links with other peoples of our region - to hold to those navigation points and weather the storm, although sometimes it feels of Biblical proportions. Nikos This is the first Asia-Pacific Triennial for me. I participated in the conference of the last one, but at that time I was still based in the UK. I was still seeing it from a distance. The history of this project was one that I heard about in positive terms while working for the journal Third Text, and it was a strange but pleasant experience to hear hard-edged cultural critics and artists from, say, India using the example of the APT as a weapon against the slothful and colonialist curatorial practices in Europe. I doubt whether the optimism that greeted the Triennial is still there. I wonder about this as a possible space of hope. Hannah In terms of then and now, the consensus seems to be that, six or even nine years ago, official rhetoric was out of step with grassroots sentiment; today, the public discourse shaped by the Howard government - which as Brian has indicated promotes a parochial, one-dimensional, Anglo-Saxon prototype of 'the Australian' - seems incompatible with the actual demography of Australia. Even just thinking about some of the major artists practising in Australia today - Savanhdary Vongpoothorn, Ah Xian, Simryn Gill, John Young, Felicia Kan, Lindy Lee: clearly the populace is very far from this narrow definition. And this is without even beginning to think about Indigenous artists. Mella Jaarsma The Netherlands/Indonesia b.1960 Hi inlander (detail) 1999 Treated skins Purchased 2000 Queensland Art Gallery Foundation Collection: Queensland Art Gallery Brian I think the reality is that those 'others' who are major artists in Australia have little recognition or consciousness in mainstream Australia. They are leading the way, as artists and writers and intellectuals are always doing, but Australia has such a poor record in these matters as far as the public is concerned. It has an anti-intellectual history, a one-dimensional culture.There is no a priori cultural assumption - that is, no notion of the importance of culture as distinct from ethnicity. Nikos I think this point of the artist as leading the way, the old idea of the avant-garde, is both critical and excessive. For me we are at a critical junction point. For many people there is a sense of despair today because the rhetorical and institutional support that was promised by the Keating period has been eviscerated. But no one really tested the depth and veracity of that rhetoric and those structures in the first place, and so I am a little suspicious about the nostalgia for this period . However, there is no doubt that we have hit an all-time geological low in the political imaginary. I think one of the wonderful qualities that is visible in Australia is the enthusiasm for novelty. We are great at starting things . But giving an idea support and making space for it to grow in unpredictable and serious ways is another matter altogether.The issues of multiculturalism, reconciliation with Indigenous people and understanding of our neighbours in the region are all complex and potentially painful. These require perseverance and commitment. Issues that one day look sexy and sublime can quickly turn slimy, messy to touch and filled with uncertain characteristics . It takes courage to keep working with an issue when the novelty appeal has shifted. I think this is where we are now - at the slimy stage. 115