The Eighth Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art

and painting portraits, images of daily life, and scenes from Creation narratives. Drawn to painting from a young age, Passi chose this medium over the carving and performance traditions of his Meriam people. His recent works have focused on the natural world to encourage people to be mindful and respectful of their environment, and to record important social and cultural practices and knowledge. Dauar 2014–15 and Waier 2015 are named after the volcanic islands off the coast of Mer and detail the islands’ natural features and geological history. Passi’s power of observation references the physical features of the islands and their history of geological evolution. The paintings are the first visual forms recording this traditional knowledge. They speak of a profound and culturally embedded knowledge of place, with ancestral links to the ancient volcanic landscapes of Papua New Guinea. HETAIN PATEL Born 1980, Bolton, UK Lives and works in London and Nottingham, UK Hetain Patel is best known for his humorous performances which draw on storytelling to investigate shifting forms of identity. His works, which probe his own familial relationships and reference music, cinema and cartoon characters, are inspired by the ironies and peculiarities of experiences of migration and diasporic upbringing. In The Jump 2015, Patel wears a homemade Spider- Man suit — the only superhero costume he found where he could completely cover his skin and not appear as the Asian or Indian superhero. The cinematic installation features Patel leaping in the air in slow motion from a squatting position — both the characteristic stance of Spider-Man, and a common pose in many Eastern cultures. It is staged in Patel’s grandmother’s living room in Bolton, the same room in which Patel spent the first five years of his life and where each member of his extended family stayed when they first immigrated to Britain. Through the recontextualisation of cultural motifs and the contrast between fantasy and reality, Patel shows the continually fluctuating and constructed nature of the self. PO PO Born 1957, Pathein, Myanmar Lives and works in Yangon, Myanmar Po Po is a pioneer in the field of conceptual and performance art in Myanmar, and has been practising as an artist since the late 1970s. For his VIP Project (Yangon/Dhaka) 2010–15, he placed VIP signs in public bus stops in the cities of Yangon and Dhaka, the capital cities of Myanmar and Bangladesh, recording the politics of how public space functions under very different political conditions. He was particularly interested in how these elitist, exclusionary signs operated in countries that have been under dictatorships or volatile political systems. Standing across the street from the bus stops, he took a series of photographs and videos documenting the reactions of people to the signs — from feelings of threat or oppression, to avoidance, or humour that the signs would be placed within the context of public transport. With a long history creating paintings, sculpture and land-based works, Po Po began working with photography in the 2000s and describes it not as a visual record, but as a means to reflect his thoughts regarding political, social and cultural concerns. NAVIN RAWANCHAIKUL Born 1971, Chiang Mai, Thailand Lives and works in Chiang Mai, Thailand, and Fukuoka, Japan Navin Rawanchaikul first showed at QAG in 1996 for ‘The Second Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art’. His signature works are panoramic figurative paintings that draw on film posters and murals, although he has worked across media to create a rich universe of interconnected stories, people and communities. He recently celebrated 20 years of his art production company, Navin Production, which emphasises the collaborative and socially engaged possibilities of art. For this milestone he created new works that looked retrospectively at the many characters, places and communities that have been a part of his career. APT8 features a series of these new works, ‘Tales of Navin 1–4’ 2015, capturing the many guises of the artist throughout his career while contemplating life and death. Accompanying the series is a letter FromNavin to Navin (January 2, 2015) 2015 Rawanchaikul has composed to himself that reflects on his relationships, love and death, including the loss of his mentor, pioneering Thai artist Montien Boonma and Rawanchaikul’s trips to Australia to assist the late artist in the 1990s. ROSANNA RAYMOND Born 1967, Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand Lives and works in Auckland Rosanna Raymond’s SaVAge K’lub project (2010–ongoing) is an installation space that is activated by various K’lub members over the course of the exhibition. The project’s title refers to a historical gentlemen’s club first established in London in the nineteenth century. Raymond’s version draws on the cultural stereotype and décor of such exclusive institutions, displaying historical artworks and images alongside newly created works and performances. The gendered, elitist aspect of the club is entirely removed, as indicated by Raymond’s reworking of the title. The ‘VA’ in SaVAge refers to a Samoan philosophical understanding of space as ‘active’, not as empty and passive, but activated by people, relationships and reciprocal obligations. Raymond’s SaVAge K’lub is enlivened by Pacific artists and local communities who have created new artworks, spoken word and performance artworks. These events re-invigorate the objects on display beyond the confines of a museum exhibit, allowing them to participate in the life of the community. Participants include: Margaret Aull, Jess Holly Bates, Eric Bridgeman, Salvador Brown, Emine Burke, Precious Clark, Croc Coulter, Lisa Fa’alafi, Charlotte Graham, Mark James Hamilton, Katrina Igglesden, Jimmy Kouratoras, Numatangi MacKenzie, Ani O’Neill, Maryann Talia Pau, Tahiarii Pariente, Aroha Rawson, Rosanna Raymond, Reina and Molana Sutton, David Siliga Setoga, Grace Taylor, Niwhai Tupaea, Suzanne and Rameka Tamaki and Jo Walsh. TSHERIN SHERPA Born 1968, Kathmandu, Nepal Lives and works in Oakland, USA From a young age, Tsherin Sherpa was trained in the art of Tibetan tangka painting 252—253 ARTIST PROFILES