ART CITIES:Hong Kong-The Shape Of Time
Based on a selection of ancient Orient objects, modern and contemporary works (Giacometti, Murakami, Baselitz, etc.), the exhibition “The Shape Of Time” invites the viewer to contemplate all the pieces as if they were in a sort of everlasting present, regardless of their country of origin or their historical context. The exhibition aims to offer a fresh, thought-provoking illustration of the timelessness of art.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Gagosian Gallery Archive
The exhibition is a collaboration of Gagosian Gallery with Gisèle Croës Arts d’Extrême-Orient (A Brussels-based antique gallery who is highly specialized in Oriental Art). It’s a dialogue and juxtaposition of Asian antiques and modern and contemporary works. The title of the exhibition alludes to George Kubler’s book of 1962 that challenged the notion of style by placing the history of objects and images in a larger continuum whereby processes of innovation, replication, and mutation are in continuous dialogue. Spanning millennia, the works are integrated without chronological mandate so that the viewer can discover fresh and unexpected correspondences between past and present. These rare artefacts are presented alongside modern and contemporary works that revisit historically persistent subjects and common formal concerns. A bronze Ding vessel is shown beside Cai Guo-Qiang’s “A Certain Lunar Eclipse: Project for Humankind No. 2”, made by exploding gunpowder to produce epic celestial forms across a 7-panel screen. In new two-part ink and wash drawings, Georg Baselitz pairs reconsidered motifs from his own oeuvre with iterations of a 19th Century self-portrait by ukiyo-e artist Katsushika Hokusai, while in “Bangkok III”, Andreas Gursky depicts the Chao Phraya as a dark, reflective flow, conjuring a lineage of painterly depictions of water.
Info: Gagosian Gallary, 7/F Pedder Building, 12 Pedder Street, Central, Hong Kong, Duration: 26/11/15-9/1/16, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-19:00, www.gagosian.com
