I'm sitting in Hong Kong airport on the way home after attending the 5th Asia Pacific Triennale in Brisbane, Australia. I was invited to give a short paper at the opening symposium. Although I had heard of and read much about the APT, this was my first visit to Brisbane. Since, the early 1990s, the Queensland Art Gallery has been organising this triennale exhibition with a focus on contemporary arts and culture from the Asia Pacific region. Much of what they show is bought and included in their very impressive collection. A feature of the show is that it does not appoint an Artistic Director or chief curator to oversee the exhibition, rather being put together by the highly knowledgable curatorial staff of the museum. This leads to a different approach to the usual thematic/ thesis-like shows of many bi/triennales today and instead seems to develop a perhaps more scholarly and intense exhibition. No doubt the fact that they collect much of what they commission plays a large part in this. Consequently, compared to other large scale international shows, there is less installation work. The triennale had no one thematic or title as such, rather being more of a scan or survey of current practices across Asia today.
The other big news of APT5 is the opening of GOMA, a new Gallery of Modern Art built next to the old Queensland Art Gallery (above picture). Designed by two Australian architects, the pavilion-like structure is simply stunning. Its sense of scale and use of materials is highly engaging and it manages to fit almost seamlessly into its site next to the river. Most of the triennale was installed in this new gallery, with its upper floors devoted to the museums collection of Asia Pacific contemporary art. The many Australian art professionals and artists at the opening weekend seemed stunned and amazed at the building of such a new space devoted to contemporary art.
The art works in the triennale were strong, with several new pieces by artists such as Dinh Q Le (Vietnam) and Khadim Ali (Afghanistan/ Pakistan) hitting particularly spots of my mind. Dinh made a new video which documented the efforts of a farmer who is trying to build a working helicopter by himself, after being obsessed with them since his childhood memories of them from the Vietnam War, the first war which utilised helicopters in large numbers. Dinh weaves together Hollywood films depicting the helicopter war (think Coppola's Huey assault in 'Apocalypse Now') with interviews and footage of thie 'new' helicopter. Khadim Ali is a painter of miniatures trained in Pakistan, who initiated a children's workshop in Bamiyan, site of the large Buddha which the Taliban destroyed. He asked the local children to draw their experiences of this event, and over fifty drawings and an accompanying documentary video are presented.
While I was in Australia a teenage boy had his leg bitten off by a shark while surfing and there was a nativity scene in a department store window enacted by walabies, koalas and kangaroos.
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