Larys Frogier Director of Rockbund Art Museum
Chair of Jury, Hugo Boss Asia Art

HUGO BOSS ASIA ART is a prestigious award, a unique exhibition of finalist artists and a proactive education-research program that aims to celebrate the richness, the diversity and the daring creativity of the emerging contemporary art in Asia.

The esteemed 2015 HUGO BOSS ASIA ART jury members selected six finalist artists who are on the forefront of the contemporary art scenes in China, Cambodia, Myanmar, Philippines, and Taiwan: Guan Xiao (Beijing), Huang Po-Chih (Taipei), Moe Satt (Yangon), Maria Taniguchi (Manila), Vandy Rattana (Phnom Penh), Yang Xinguang (Beijing).

The 2015 HUGO BOSS ASIA ART reflects and supports the new interconnections of contemporary art in Asia. Indeed, during the past few years, artists, curators, art institutions, and researchers working in Asia have been more actively involved in the following objectives:
- to support intra-Asia artists’ collaborative projects;
- to curate art exhibitions between different localities;
- to build new collections of Asian contemporary art;
- to highlight excluded or forgotten areas from the international contemporary art scene and history.

From the small-scale independent curatorial projects to the large format of the Asian biennales, from the deep art archives research to the museums’ collection and curatorial program, such new context indicates a decisive change in the way of envisioning and supporting the contemporary arts in Asia: instead of being limited by self-centered and self-sufficient nationalists cultural policies, rather than waiting for any “Asian Art” label coming from the Western art standards, individuals and art organizations are now opening the doors to invent unexpected projects and to promote exciting cross collaborations.

The 2015 HUGO BOSS ASIA ART symposium is a unique opportunity to observe and to debate about the different shifting contexts of the contemporary art in Asia. The symposium invites high profiles artists, independent curators, and institution directors to share their experiences and projects from which they will dig out decisive concepts and practices for the future development of contemporary art in Asia.

A first perspective is to build a panorama of the localities contexts in Asia where art projects are implemented, raising questions about how artists, creators and museums negotiate the connections of the art with the social, economical, political and cultural contexts. Beyond localism, such analysis is crucial to better position artists on a broaden Asian and international scope.

A second angle offers to share some curatorial experiences that independent and institutional art professionals are achieving in Asia. The rich diversity of the curatorial projects, from museums’ program to biennales and to independent initiatives, demonstrates the growing expectations from the Asian art communities for further, stronger cross-collaborative research program, exhibitions and publications.

Schedule

Morning Session
CURATING ASIA

9:00-9:30 Sign in

9:30-9:35 Moderate: Liu Yingjiu (Deputy director of RAM) 

9:35-9:50   Introduction: Larys Frogier (Director of RAM) 

9:50-10:20  Yuko Hasegawa (Chief Curator of Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo)

Trajectory towards History (past) and Future

10:20-10:40  Li Qi (Senior Curator at Rockbund Art Museum)

In-between Borders: Engage the Regional Dynamics in Asia

10:40-11:00  Yongwoo Lee (Executive Director of Shanghai Himalayas Museum)

Is the Biennial the Solution to the ‘Post-White Cube’?

11:00-11:20  Refreshment Break

11:20-11:40  Hou Hanru (Artistic Director of MAXXI, National Museum of 21st Century Arts)

Curating from the Edge

11:40-12:00  Doryun Chong (Chief Curator at M+ Hong Kong)

Pragmatically Ethical Curating: The Case of M+, Hong Kong

12:00-12:30  Larys Frogier (Director of RAM)

Discussion                              

Afternoon Session
ASIA IN CONTEXTS

14:30-14:50  Ute Meta Bauer (Founding Director of Nanyang Technological University Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore)

Spaces of the Curatorial

14:50-15:10  Amy Cheng (Independent curator)

Lost and Recovered, Continuity and Rupture -- the Historical Consciousness of Taiwan’s Contemporary Art

15:10-15:30  Arlette Quỳnh-Anh Trần (Curator and writer)

Contemporary art in Post Colonialist Asia

15:30-15:50  Refreshment Break

15:50-16:10  Heman Chong (Artist, curator and writer)

Words, They, Wrote

16:10-17:00  Li Qi (Senior Curator at Rockbund Art Museum)

Discussion