"Our Everyday—Our Borders" is an exhibition developed through workshops and public engagement. It brings together works by two Asian artists, Tang Kwok Hin (Hong Kong) and Motoyuki Shitamichi (Japan) to reflect on the themes of the everyday and its borders. Though walking into the lives of local volunteers or establishing dialogue during workshops with secondary school students, they dealt with the imaginary boundaries born from geographical conditions and quotidian human relations. This artists’ talk brings together Tang and Shitamichi along with curator Frank Vigneron and independent curator/writer Yeung Yang to revisit this art-making experience and explore the methodologies and possibilities of transforming social dialogues into art.
Seats are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Please RSVP by clicking the “Book Now” button on the Tai Kwun website or via the Tai Kwun App. Lectures will be conducted in English with Cantonese interpretation available.
Art After Hours is an event series presented by Tai Kwun Contemporary that will talk with you, sing with you, and strive to always show you something new. Typically taking place on Fridays at 7pm, Art After Hours let visitors experience contemporary art in Hong Kong live, where artists, writers, public intellectuals, and curators are invited to host a mélange of events such as talks performances, and screenings.
Mixed media artist, independent curator and writer Tang Kwok-hin was born in 1983 and raised in Hong Kong. He received his Master of Fine Arts from the Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2008 and Bachelor of Arts (major in Fine Arts) in 2006. Tang began his artistic path with continuous queries towards his native background, and soon developed explorations towards origins of existence and intimate aesthetics inseparably connected to the course and experiences of his life. He often appropriates and reconstructs daily and personal contexts to narrate hidden stories in life and express concerns towards humans and their surroundings, dealing with growth, inheritance, freedom, capitalism, consumerism, nature, politics, norms, etc.
His works are widely exhibited in local and international exhibitions, and was awarded the first prize at Hong Kong Contemporary Art Biennial 2009, the Sovereign Asian Art Prize 2010, 2011 and 2014, the Young Artist Award by Hong Kong Arts Development Awards 2010, and received the Asian Cultural Council grant in 2013. Collectors of his art include Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong Heritage Museum, Deutsche Bank, Amelia Johnson Contemporary as well as individuals from all over the world, from United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Singapore to Austria, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, etc.
Born 1978 in Okayama and currently living in Nagoya, Motoyuki Shitamichi received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from Musashino Art University in 2001. Profoundly interested in narratives that have been largely forgotten and buried by everyday lives and concerns, the works of Motoyuki Shitamichi neither document scenes nor archive historical facts but prefer to address the issues of the everyday through the exploration of personal and public histories. For example, Shitamichi has spent four years traveling around Japan, surveying and photographing the remains of gun emplacements, fighter hangars, and other military structures, publishing these works in the Bunkers series (2001-2005). He has also photographed Japanese shrine gates, the Torii, in America, Taiwan, Russia, Korea, and many other locations with Japanese colonial occupation history, which was published in the well-known Torii series (2006- 2012). Shitamichi’s work has been exhibited widely in Japan and international exhibitions. He was selected as the Japan representing artist in 58th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia in 2019.
Frank Vigneron is Chair and Professor at the Department of Fine Arts, The Chinese University of Hong Kong. His research focuses on the history of Chinese paintings from the 18th century onwards and on contemporary Chinese art as seen in a global context. He received a PhD in Chinese Art History from the Paris VII University, a PhD on Comparative Literature from the Paris IV Sorbonne University, and a Doctorate of Fine Arts from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Professor Vigneron is also a practicing artist and a writer. He has held several solo exhibitions in Hong Kong and has taken part in local and international exhibitions. His recent publications include “Hong Kong Soft Power: Art Practices in the Special Administrative Region, 2005-2014” and “I Like Hong Kong: Art and Deterritorialisation.” He has lived in Hong Kong since 1990.
Yeung Yang is an independent curator, writer and university lecturer, for which she plays the roles of identifying, curating, and researching new programmes, managing existing ones, and supervising, executing and developing strategic plans. In recent years, she has been commissioned by artists and academics locally and in the US, Germany, Singapore and Australia, to contribute critical writings and reviews for exhibition catalogues, art anthologies, and academic discussions. She founded non-profit Soundpocket in 2008 to promote sound as art and its research and education in Hong Kong. (www.soundpocket.org.hk). She was awarded the Asian Cultural Council Fellowship in 2013 and currently teaches Western and Chinese classics at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
