‘We’re in the post-apocalypse now’: artist creates a deformed world filled with expired Nokia phones and Game Boys

Andrew Luk likes to change materials – he likens it to alchemy. For his latest installation, he used paint thinner to make holes in insulation foam

The American-born Hong Kong artist says he does not see art as meditative or therapeutic – it has to be challenging and push past being comfortable

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Concrete towers of old technology, and creepy pink orbs – a new installation by Hong Kong artist Andrew Luk examines the human impact on the environment. Photo: James Wendlinger

Published: 4:00pm, 10 Apr 2020Updated: 5:38pm, 10 Apr 2020

Resembling a cross between a UFO and a deformed coral reef, large pink, orb-like structures hover like an eerie constellation. Remnants of a wasteland populate the space below, and redundant electronic devices – Walkmans, Game Boys and Nokia mobile phones – appear as artefacts, stacked on top of one another.

Welcome to the post-apocalyptic world, as imagined by Hong Kong artist Andrew Luk. “I was thinking about a post-apocalyptic landscape,” says the 32-year-old of his most recent artwork, Haunted, Salvaged, a large-scale installation. “I think we’re in it now.”

Given current global events – an unprecedented pandemic, political upheaval, economic recession and a climate change crisis – he might just be right. “An artist’s role is to reflect the times we live in,” says the American-born, Hong Kong-raised artist.

This dramatic installation will go on show in “Shifting Landscapes”, a new exhibition at de Sarthe Gallery in Wong Chuk Hang, opposite paintings by abstract expressionist painter Chu Teh-chun.

Andrew Luk’s Rarified Fossil Heap, a version of which is used in “Haunted, Salvaged”. Photo: James Wendlinger

These artworks were supposed to be part of this year’s Art Basel Hong Kong fair, which was cancelled because of the coronavirus outbreak. Luk had been among 12 international artists selected to create a large-scale sculptural installation for the fair’s “Encounters” section. Haunted, Salvaged was conceived with the now cancelled event in mind, he says.

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