WHILE CHINA CELEBRATES its first official showing at this year's Venice Biennale - with the opening of its pavilion at the Giardino delle Vergini at the Arsenale - Hong Kong and Taiwan remain on the periphery of this significant and prestigious international art event.
Nonetheless, artists participating in the so-called collateral events regard their exhibitions (which run from Sunday) as a great opportunity to showcase their works to the world - and, in the case of Taiwanese artists, to challenge the perception of Asian art.
Taipei Fine Arts Museum (TFAM) exhibition curator for Venice, Jason Wang Chia-chi, chose the theme The Spectre of Freedom to reflect the troubled state of the world.
Visitors to the TFAM site in the Italian Pavilion can also chart the island's decade-long involvement at Venice in an exhibition entitled Contemporary Art from Taiwan at the Venice Biennial 1995-2003, which runs until August 14.
But it will be Taiwan's resident artist Chen Chieh-jen who's expected to draw the most attention. In his video installation The Factory, a follow-up to his 1999 showing at Venice, Chen comments on the often devastating effects of globalisation by tracing the lives of unemployed garment factory workers whose jobs moved to the mainland in the wake of Deng Xiaoping's reform.
Picking up the theme of globalisation's adverse effects, a group of four graduate students from Taipei's National University of the Arts say they hope to challenge the western-dominated international art market. They're offering a US$20,000 cash prize to any artist officially attending Venice who best embodies resistance to the cultural homogenisation machine.