Charwei Tsai and Eugene Tan introducing the exhibition
A Solo Exhibition by Charwei Tsai Curated by Eugene Tan Espace Louis Vuitton, Singapore 15 November 2012 ~ March 2013
Exhibition viewLanyu – Three Stories, 2012, Exhibition viewLanyu I~VI, 2012, Exhibition viewLanyu – Three Stories, 2012, Exhibition viewExhibition viewA Dedication to the Victims of the Tsunami of March 11, 2011 – Sea Urchin, 2012 Light box created for the exhibitionA Dedication to the Victims of
the Tsunami of March 11, 2011 Series, 2012~2013Exhibition OpeningExhibition OpeningExhibition OpeningSea Mantra, 2009 and A Pilgrimage Through Light and Spells, 2012, Exhibition viewLovely Daze at Louis Vuitton BookstoreEspace Louis Vuitton, Singapore, Exterior view
Press Release: “A Dedication to the Sea” by Taiwanese artist, Charwei Tsai, will explore the sea and its many complex and mystical facets. Central to Tsai’s practice is the act of inscription of the seminal Buddhist text, the Heart Sutra. The sutra highlights the ‘emptiness’ and ephemeral nature of all phenomena as the only eternal condition. In previous works, Tsai has inscribed the Heart Sutra onto organic and impermanent objects, such as tofu, mushrooms and bonsai plants, thereby manifesting the transience and ephemerality posited by the sutra as a corporeal experience. This exhibition extends Tsai’s examination of transience and ephemerality to our relationship with the sea. Sea Mantra and other works in the exhibition, where Tsai continues her inscription of the Heart Sutra, will highlight the compelling beauty of the sea, but also the ephemerality of this condition. The beauty or sensation of the sublime that the sea invokes is inseparable from it vastness and its scale, which is also the source of its destructive power, thereby also invoking a sense of unease, which can border on the terrifying.
The exhibition will therefore also explore the sea as the source of life and death. Created in collaboration with Tibetan director Tsering Tashi Gyalthang on the island of Lanyu, or Orchid Island, off the southeastern coast of Taiwan, a series of videos and photographs will highlight the importance of the sea not only for the livelihood of coastal communities, who live off fishing, but also for their culture. This works will focus on women from the Tao tribe and their performance of ritual dance, which involves using their sensuous long hair to emulate the movement of waves, as a way to ensure the safe return of their men from the sea, thereby highlight the tensions in our relationship with the sea and the dangers that it can pose.
Tsai’s exhibition thereby reflects upon the varied and complex relationships that the sea has to our contemporary society through meditation on a culture that revolves closely around nature. It further explores the intricate relationships between indigenous belief, the spiritual realm and impermanence.
3 HD Videos with sound, 4 min each In collaboration with Tsering Tashi Gyalthang Video
The Lanyu – 3 Stories continues Tsai’s exploration of the relationship between nature, spirituality, and ritual through an examination of the Tao tribe from the Lanyu Island of Taiwan. This series consists of three videos: Hair Dance, Lanyu Seascapes, and Shi Na Paradna. Hair Dance focuses on women from the Tao tribe and their performance of ritual dance, one of which involves using their sensuous long hair to emulate the movement of waves, as a way to ensure the safe return of their men from the sea. Lanyu Seascapes captures the unpredictability of the sea that the natives have learned to live from moment to moment with. While Shi Na Paradna portrays a tale of a boy who lost his soul to the sea and his grandfather performed a ritual of call his soul back from the sea.
Hand-inscribed photographs 120x150cm In collaboration with Tsering Tashi Gyalthang
In Lanyu I-X, the Heart Sutra is written on a series of photographs that captures the different states of the sea in Lanyu, an island in the southeast of Taiwan after a devastating typhoon (tropical storm).
Lanyu ILanyu IILanyu IIILanyu IVLanyu VLanyu VILanyu VIIILanyu IX
Bonsai Series I~IX, 2011 and A Pilgrimage through Light & Spells, 2012
Now Ink II Curated by Art Hub Asia (Defne Ayas, Qiu Zhijie, Davide Quadrio) SH Contemporary, Shanghai, China 6~9 September 2012
Exhibited Work: – Bonsai Series I~IX, 2011, Hand-inscribed lithographs – A Pilgrimage through Light & Spells, 2012, Artist’s Book
Bonsai Series I~IX, 2011 and A Pilgrimage through Light & Spells, 2012
Press Release: For a second year, SH Contemporary presents an extended exhibition – curated by Arthub Asia with its extended network of curators – examining perspectives on the use of the traditional Chinese medium of ink, and the artistic processes of ink painting and calligraphy, as part of contemporary transcultural visual and performative artistic practice by eighteen Chinese and international artists.
The term “water and ink” has developed into an increasingly inclusive and scalable term, to assume a broadened definition covering new and diverse artistic forms. It is based on the skills of traditional ink paintings, modern ink paintings using water and ink as a medium, and diversified exploratory efforts beyond the limits of “brush and ink” (Bi Mo). In addition, it encompasses water and ink as a medium, not always in the literal sense of using water, ink and calligraphic brush, but rather focusing on problems within Chinese ink painting traditions, taking them forward in other contemporary media formats, such as, in this exhibition through live performance, performance on stage and as a process of ritual, intervention of space, participatory practice and the documentation of performative action.
Another key focus of the exhibition is the relationship between East and West, looking directly at the process of transcultural translation as to how Chinese and international artists re-interpret and re-appropriate Chinese ink art in Western contexts, whilst it is re-negotiated in its original cultural contexts of China and the cultures of East and South Asia.
The future of Chinese ink art lies not only in the continuation of “brush and ink” (Bi Mo) skills, the preservation and documentation of water and ink as a medium, and the enrichment they provide in terms of artistic contexts, but also, more importantly in the exploitation of the yet untouched traditions and resources of Chinese painting. By experimenting freely with new media and contemporary means of expressions, Chinese ink art is enabled to break free from the traditional frameworks and cultural infrastructures, and in turn develop new modes of artistic enquiry and discourse as part of contemporary art history. In a similar spirit to what is found in contemporary Chinese ink art practice, the artists featured in the India Focus of this edition of SH Contemporary section leverage new technology and insight to question the use of ink and suggest new possibilities for its future potential.
This year Arthub Asia invited curators and scholars Xiang Liping, Rachel Marsden, and Diana Campbell to join Davide Quadrio, Defne Ayas and Qiu Zhijie to help realize this extensive exhibition.
A Pilgrimage Through Light & Spells – Bamboo Mantra I, 2012, Installation view
Curated by Mami Kataoka Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, USA 18 May ~ 2 September 2012
Exhibited Works: – A Pilgrimage Through Light & Spells – Bamboo Mantra I & II, 2012, Lithographs – Bamboo Mantra, 2012, Installation
Bamboo Mantra, 2012, Installation viewBamboo Mantra (Details), 2012, Installation viewCharwei Tsai, Jompet, Jagannath Panda and moderator Glen Helfand Panel discussion organized by Asian Contemporary Art Week, San Francisco
Press Release: This May, the Asian Art Museum debuts Phantoms of Asia: Contemporary Awakens the Past, an ambitious exhibition exploring the complex, diverse, cross-cultural perspectives of Asian cosmology and spirituality through a compelling interplay of 140 artworks from the past and present.
Phantoms of Asia—the first large-scale exhibition of contemporary art organized by the Asian Art Museum—fills its special exhibition galleries with artworks by living artists and integrates new works throughout the museum’s renowned pan-Asian collections. Providing visitors with immersive experiences, the exhibition offers rare insights into a range of belief systems and mythologies that have shaped Asian cultures over the ages.
On view May 18–September 2, 2012, and featuring more than 60 works by 31 contemporary artists, including Hiroshi Sugimoto (Japan/USA), Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Thailand), Adeela Suleman (Pakistan), Raqib Shaw (India), and Choi Jeong Hwa (Korea), alongside 90 objects from the museum’s collections—some dating back 2,000 years—Phantoms of Asia challenges visitors to view traditional objects not as relics of the past, but as vibrant connections to the present.
“The concept of phantoms—or ‘spirits’—is elusive, yet it’s felt and shared across cultures and time periods,” said Jay Xu, museum director. “Through its emphasis on interconnectivity, this exhibition provides a rare opportunity to experience those ‘invisible forces’ in a tangible, accessible, and provocative way, with Asian art at the center.”
Curated by Mami Kataoka, chief curator of Tokyo’s Mori Art Museum, in collaboration with Allison Harding, assistant curator of contemporary art at the Asian Art Museum, Phantoms of Asia is organized around four themes: (1) Asian Cosmologies: Envisioning the Invisible; (2) World, Afterworld: Living Beyond Living; (3) Myth, Ritual, Meditation: Communing with Deities; and (4) Sacred Mountains: Encountering the Gods.
The exhibition includes artworks by contemporary artists hailing from Canada, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Iran, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, Tibet, and the U.S. Many of the contemporary installations are new or site-specific commissions. When combined with objects from the museum’s collections, these artworks represent a vast array of materials, forms and media, including works of stone, metal, fabric, wood, and modern materials; and masks, textiles, sculptures, ceramics, film and video, photographs, and paintings.
Expressing the museum’s new aspiration to “awaken the past and inspire the next,” the building itself will undergo a transformation to meet the full-scale challenges of the exhibition, starting with a 24-foot installation outside the museum, moving into the building’s public courtyards, and finally throughout the special exhibition and collection galleries.
Asian Cosmologies: Envisioning the Invisible The exhibition begins with Choi Jeong Hwa’s (Korea) 24-foot red lotus (titled Breathing Flower) in Civic Center Plaza, across the street from the museum. With motorized bright red fabric leaves opening and closing, simulating the movement of a live lotus flower, the installation creates a link between the modern world and one of the most important cosmological symbols in Asia.
Inside the museum, Sun K. Kwak’s (Korea/USA) site-specific drawing made with masking tape dramatically transforms the museum’s North Court, manifesting invisible energies in the space. Kwak’s installation relies on the artist’s process of “lyrical meditation” to detect the subtle energies in the room, and serves to shift visitors’ consciousness from the mundane concerns of daily life to the spiritual/cosmological themes of Phantoms of Asia.
The exhibition then takes a look at the future, with Heman Chong’s (Singapore) installation, Calendars (2020–2096). One thousand and one calendar pages, each showing one of Chong’s photographs of public and domestic spaces, transfigure the installation space. Repetition, an imagined future time, and haunting stillness encourage meditation on being and absence, mortality and eternity.
Moving into Lee Gallery, Hiroshi Sugimoto’s (Japan/USA) Five-Elements series stands as a shrine to the origins of existence. Seven crystal pagodas resting on wooden plinths form a single, stark line across the gallery. Using geometric symbols from thirteenth-century Buddhism, Sugimoto encases a single image from his iconic Seascape series in each glass structure. The sea and air, origins of all life, are seen through a prism of ancient Buddhist views of the universe.
In Hambrecht Gallery, several objects from the museum’s collections present traditional Asian cosmographic symbols. In one area, Chinese bronze mirrors (some dating back to 480 BCE) depict the cosmos on their nonreflecting sides even as they reflect the real, earthly world on their polished surfaces. The mirrors orient viewers to Poklong Anading’s (Philippines) Anonymity series, where subjects hold mirrors to their faces to reflect flashes of light into the camera. With people’s faces obscured, Anading’s photographs ask viewers to consider how they construct personal and collective identity. In another section, Guo Fengyi’s (China) drawings map the flow of energy through the artist’s own nervous system. Influenced by her study of qigong, the drawings illustrate the experience of artistic practice as spiritual practice. Palden Weinreb’s (USA/Tibet) minimalist works (including paintings and light boxes) are meditations on existence and the universe: “Abstraction,” Weinreb suggests, “parallels the sublime emptiness of Buddhism.”
World, Afterworld: Living Beyond Living Works in the next phase of the exhibition explore the connection between this life and the afterworld. The theme begins in Hambrecht Gallery with Araya Radsjarmrearnsook’s (Thailand) video installation, The Class, in which the artist gives a seminar on death to several shrouded corpses. Her lecture prompts our own contemplation: How do we speak about death? What do we envision in the afterworld?
Between Hambrecht and Osher Galleries, Jakkai Siributr’s (Thailand) Karma Cash & Carrydepicts a spirit house similar to those found in the artist’s native country. Siributr’s work shows the intersection of modern-day animism, Buddhist practice, and material culture. Jompet’s (Indonesia) Anno Domini, an arrangement of colonial military uniforms hanging bodiless, reenacts traditional mythologies, symbolizing protection from the exigencies of modernization and colonization.
Also just outside Osher Gallery, Takayuki Yamamoto’s (Japan) San Francisco version of his ongoing video project, What Kind of Hell Will We Go To, documents the artist’s workshop with elementary school children from the Bayview area. After showing students the Kumano Kanjin Jikkai Mandala, a collection of traditional Japanese paintings depicting Buddhist notions of vice, virtue, and punishment, Yamamoto then encourages them to create and talk about cardboard dioramas representing their own ideas of hell. These dioramas are presented along with the video.
Myth, Ritual, Meditation: Communing with Deities Marking the transition to the third theme, seventeen traditional masks greet visitors at the entrance of Osher Gallery. Masks play an integral role in ceremonies and rituals across many Asian cultures, and provide the context for Motohiko Odani’s (Japan) carvings. Odani’s SP Extra: Malformed Noh Mask Series: San Yujo transforms the surface of Noh masks to depict the sinew and flesh of the human face, exposing the vulnerable underside of the masks’ spiritual beauty.
Communication between humans, plants, and animals plays a part in the mythologies of many cultures. Several artists take up this theme in Osher Gallery. In Jagannath Panda’s (India) The Cult of Survival II, the artist symbolizes endless cycles of consumption and production in the form of a snake crafted from pipes. Adeela Suleman (Pakistan) uses stainless steel reliefs of natural objects—birds, flowers, trees—to act as storytellers. Interrupting these traditional motifs are contemporary images of death (including suicide vests), prompting awareness of the ever-present threat of violence and extinction and the transitory nature of all things.
Within the gallery, Adrian Wong (USA/Hong Kong) constructs two rooms following the precepts of feng shui (a system of geomancy that attempts to incorporate laws of heaven and earth), one auspicious and the other inauspicious. Using Korean ceremonial objects from the museum’s collection, Wong experiments with the space between spaces and challenges visitors to tune into nearly imperceptible harmonies and disharmonies.
Sacred Mountains: Encountering the Gods Sacred mountains have a place of prominence in Hinduism and Buddhism, among other religions, and several artists working with this theme are featured in the second-floor Tateuchi Gallery. Lin Xue (China/Hong Kong) connects to a spiritual past through his paintings of imagined mountains, rendered with a sharpened bamboo twig. His Untitled 2010-9 takes experiences from mountainous landscapes to create newly imagined landscapes, such as an island floating among an ocean replete with marine life. Aki Kondo’s (Japan) newest work, which depicts mountain deities, was motivated by the March 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.
Exploring the same theme, but located in the Korean gallery on the second floor, Bae Young-whan’s (Korea) depictions of nature demonstrate a view of the body as a microcosm of the universe; for example, his installation of tiny ceramic mountain ranges echo the shape of his brain waves.
ASIAN ART MUSEUM’S NEW VISION: INTERCONNECTIVITY WITHIN ASIA AND WITH THE REST OF THE WORLD
Partnering curator Kataoka suggests, “Asia is not a timeless construct,” but rather an ever-evolving concept that can “awaken a new awareness of our existence in this world.” Harding considers how the collection at the Asian Art Museum connects to art of today’s Asia and “how these traditional and contemporary objects can reveal new aspects of each other.”
To express these points of view, regional artists’ works are situated among traditional objects in the museum’s region-specific galleries, including Raqib Shaw’s (India/UK) hedonistic, dreamlike canvases in the South Asian galleries. The Kashmiri artist fuses influences as diverse as Japanese screens, Mughal miniatures, and Hieronymus Bosch paintings. Shaw’s style is both opulent and fastidious: his materials include glitter, rhinestones, and industrial paint, all applied painstakingly with a porcupine quill.
In the Chinese Buddhist sculpture gallery, Charwei Tsai’s (Taiwan) minimalist works evoke meditations on the ephemeral. Tsai’s calligraphy of the Chinese characters of the Heart Sutra on organic, transitory materials—tofu, mushrooms, lotus leaves—are exercises in the Buddhist precept of nonattachment.
“We hope visitors will connect with the essence of creative activity in Asia, a region that is rapidly changing on the surface, but where ancient phantoms still linger and spread their spells,” said Kataoka.
Participating Artists:
Poklong Anading – Philippines Ringo Bunoan – Philippines Heman Chong – Singapore Lin Chuan-Chu – Taiwan Guo Fengyi – China Hyon Gyon – Korea NS Harsha – India Choi Jeong Hwa – Korea Pouran Jinchi – Iran Jompet – Indonesia Aki Kondo – Japan Sun K. Kwak – Korea/USA Fuyuko Matsui – Japan Prabhavathi Meppayil – India Motohiko Odani – Japan Jagannath Panda – India Araya Radsjarmrearnsook – Thailand Varunika Saraf – India Raqib Shaw – India/United Kingdom Jakkai Siributr – Thailand Yoshihiro Suda – Japan Hiroshi Sugimoto – Japan Adeela Suleman – Pakistan Charwei Tsai – Taiwan Howie Tsui – Hong Kong/Canada Apichatpong Weerasethakul – Thailand Palden Weinreb – USA/Tibet Bae Young Whan – Korea Adrian Wong – USA/Hong Kong Lin Xue – China/Hong Kong Takayuki Yamamoto – Japan
