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“Interval in Space”
Osage Art Foundation, Hong Kong

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Earlier this year in July, a group of young Hong Kong artists travelled to the village of Scuol in Switzerland to take part in a residency program, and to exhibit their work alongside that of a group of Swiss and Austrian artists.
The exhibition comprised the work of Hong Kong artists Au Hoi Lam, Nadim Abbas, Sarah Lai, Kingsley Ng and Lee Kit alongside work by Beat Feller, Zilla Leutenegger, Matthias Liechti, Boris Rebetez and Judith Fegerl.

In December 2017, these artists will come together again in Hong Kong as the second part of the project “Interval in Space”, presented by the Osage Art Foundation and the NAIRS Foundation and co-organised by the Consulate General of Switzerland in Hong Kong.

The project is curated by Harald Kraemer (Switzerland / Hong Kong), Janine Stoll (Switzerland) and Charles Merewether (Hong Kong).

Co-Curator Charles Merewether says “The collaborative exhibition ‘Interval in Space’ reminds us of the question of globalization and the local in characterizing contemporary culture. As such, the exhibition shows us that while there are common traits that inform all modern and contemporary artistic practice, there are also significant differences. No more so are these differences evident than in placing Asian and European artists together, in this case Hong Kong and Swiss artists. Together the five Hong Kong artists show in different ways how the social sphere appears as the subject of their practice.”

Co-Curator Harald Kraemer describes these differences as follows: “The Hong Kong artists explore objects in space but often beginning with the domestic, the mundane and everyday. This is the point of departure. Recreating a living room, a bathroom or just a bed or a table their installations generate new narratives. Defined once as ‘social sculpture’, their installations fuse spatial design, paintings, everyday objects, sound to invoke the question of place and memory of the personal. They are immersive environments, often times creating a precarious relationship with reality, destablising a viewer’s perception of space, creating a precarious relationship with reality. In certain cases the work might playfully engage with kitsch or create a sense of estrangement with the familiar or to the contrary, forming quiet moments that escape the purview of the everyday, evoking calm and tranquility. The engagement of art with ordinary objects brings a poetry to the mundane, heightening the viewer’s sense of everyday life. Such practice belongs to a long tradition of engagement with everyday life but there in a new dimension to this contemporary manifestation.

The artists from Switzerland and Austria have started their artistic work with a more classical understanding of volume, space and sculpture. For them often the challenge is to respect the existing spatial situation by analyse it at the same time. The reflection and therefore the reaction can be an intervention in form of an alienation, a manipulation or even a destruction of the existing space. They are responding to the characteristics of the given architecture in many ways. Their interventions can look like a set design, a forgotten ornament, an architectural detail, a construction site or an exhibition inside the exhibition. By describing the shown intervals in space, the visitors learn in many ways more about their own position in the interplay of diverse spaces as well as they can fill the seen with their own imagination.”

The artists Au Hoi Lam, Sarah Lai, Kingsley Ng, Beat Feller, Matthias Liechti and Boris Rebetez will all be present at the opening on Friday 15 December 2017

The schedule for Friday 15 December 2017 begins with a talk session with the artists and the curators from 4.00pm to 5.30pm. Following on from this, Co-curator Harald Kraemer will lead a tour of the exhibition from 5.30pm to 6.00pm. The Vernissage hosted by the Consulate General of Switzerland in Hong Kong begins at 6.00pm.

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