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Norman Ford

Line Feed

Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre

Reviewed: April 8

Line Feed, part of the ongoing Asian Traffic exhibition, comprises works from  Hong Kong and Australian-Asian artists. Set in the  claustrophobic space of the Hong Kong  Visual Arts Centre, it includes photography, video, sound, knitting, installation and more.

The Hong Kong section,  by first-time curator Christina  Li, holds together well, with  consistency and intriguing choices throughout. The Australian section   is more uneven.

Highlights include New Zealander (and Hong Kong resident) Tan Yuk-king's  playful ice and balsa  sculptures (right) and Magdalen Wong's Hong Kong Sound Score Series, an audio work  in which Cantonese and English voices pronounce junk-food ingredients  as if it were an  aural language test.

Tan's ice sculpture, melting  in the stifling interior, was perversely beautiful  and nicely out of place.  Mahmoud Yekta's  video Uncommon Sense is an intriguing  visual exploration.

Tozer Pak's dry video Familiar number, unknown telephone, based on a random  phone  conversation, is puzzling.  Similarly, Koky Saly's photos of young gay men in circular-cropped photographs are amateurish and ambiguous.

I'm usually sceptical when  a show explicitly employs a curatorial premise  such as mobility or border-crossing,  but more of the works could  have addressed the issues of cultural mixing directly, as have Tan and Wong.   Overall, the exhibition seems  scattered.

Nonetheless, it's  a rare chance to see such a provocative cross-section of art - much of it more than worth the visit.

Ends Apr 15



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Line Feed