[Press Release]
Osage Gallery is pleased to present the solo exhibition “NG Sai Kit: Meta Landscape” at
Osage Open from 11 January to 8 February 2013. 11 photography artworks from the latest series “Meta Landscape” will be on showcased.
In recent years, NG Sai Kit’s artistic direction has been inspired by spatial concerns and
urban iconography, and recently it is transformed into an investigation of the nature of “photography” and “seeing”. NG uses large-format camera to manipulate the depth of field it captures, or positions the objects to be photographed in unlikely locations, thus deconstructing and reassembling the screen of content as depicted in photographic space. This produces a disorienting effect for the viewer, who begins to doubt and question their perception as it relates to their field of vision; a renewed engagement with the artist’s arrangement of spatial organization occurs as a result, letting the eye wander in a continually self-reflexive manner.
NG Sai Kit’s compositional treatment of landscape is exact; it fits precisely in his sense of the picture plane, never deviating from a measured view. His landscapes feature no characters, main or supporting, and all things contained within them appear as if existing in
and of themselves. These seemingly nondescript surfaces could apparently be, from a casual glance, precursors to descriptions of mountains or the countryside, or perhaps they convey a sense of texture and composition to be explored; yet none of these quite articulate the main point. The existence of a countryside allows NG to be more freely and purely project his complex view of the world and his compositional approach stemming from such a perspective. Under the artist’s treatment, focused and out-of-focused area are thrown into jarring contrast through the deployment of an extremely shallow depth of field, at the same time they are dispersed throughout the picture; therefore the smooth transition of focus is taken-out, there is no longer any easy passage through or way out of the terrain. Reasonable spatial hints of near or far are abandoned, and suddenly the viewer’s vision is no longer a reliable tool for perceiving the world. Navigating these spaces is akin to crossing a river by feeling for the rocks, an uncertain compass – the indeterminate vantage point in his picture is like the rock that gives us pause when traversing such waters.
The notion of landscape is a phenomenon of ”seeing”, a projection of the photographer’s
thought. Landscape as envisioned by NG Sai Kit is a meditative arena for self-scrutiny. His acute instinct for grasping space that lies before him produces a rich dialogue with nature.
Combining an inscrutable eye for detail and a profound immersion into photographic language, NG Sai Kit’s lens-based statements heighten the photographic reality of natural scenery to the level as if one lively perceives the natural scenery through sight, reaching a point at which viewer and landscape are in mutual looking. A keen self-awareness is instigated in the viewer along this journey through photographic space.
The book launch of Meta-landscapes is scheduled to be on the same evening as the opening reception of exhibition. Supported by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council, the book contains further works in a more complete collection of the Meta-landscapes series. At the same time, four important cultural figures, among them local scholars, curators, and photographic practitioners, have been invited to contribute essays on NG Sai Kit’s work, giving it theoretical analysis in addition to positioning the work in an art-historical context, presenting an in-depth look into the artist’s particular vision and the revelatory and influential importance of the work amidst the contemporary discourse on Hong Kong
photography.
