Project File: Materials of the Future: Documenting Contemporary Chinese Art from 1980-1990
This archival project includes a comprehensive collection of primary research materials including books, periodicals, newspapers, exhibition ephemera, video recordings, documentary film, and correspondence. Several in-depth interviews with key artists, curators, and critics are also included, alongside a documentary film about experimental art entitled From Jean-Paul Sartre to Teresa Teng: Contemporary Cantonese Art in the 1980s, as well as a digitised selection of materials related to Cantonese art in the 1980s.
This project culminated with a collaboration between Asia Art Archive and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York for a series of events in Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, and New York—including panel discussions with key artists and critics, as well as a presentation of MoMA’s publication titled Contemporary Chinese Art: Primary Documents edited by Professor Wu Hung.
Visit the Materials of the Future website here
100 Folders, 383 Records
Relevant content
1989 China/Avant-Garde Exhibition
Digitised archival documentation surrounding the important Beijing exhibition
Materials of the Future: Documenting Contemporary Chinese Art from 1980-1990
In 2006, AAA began locating, collecting, and preserving a large body of important material from the 1980s, a period in China's art history that was in danger of being lost.
Building Asia Art Archive, Part 3
How does AAA make decisions about what it collects? Jane DeBevoise and Anthony Yung discuss AAA’s China projects in relation to this query
China 1980s: Art in the Age of Social Transformation
Sat, 25 Feb 2017, 10 AM – 1 PM
Learning What Can't Be Taught: In Conversation with Leah Wang Lihua and Chen Haiyan
Sat, 6 Feb 2021, 10–11:30am HKT
Learning What Can't Be Taught | Workshop with Tozer Pak Sheung Chuen
Sat, 26 Jun 2021, 2-4pm HKT
Learning What Can’t Be Taught
17 December 2020–26 June 2021
China 1980s: Art in the Age of Social Transformation
WATCH: This talk explores crucial issues that transformed Chinese society, perspectives, and art in the 1980s