Open Platform, held at Art Basel, is an integral programme as part of Asia Art Archive's endeavour to enable new thinking and critical dialogue around recent art in Asia. 

 

Cultural practitioners from all disciplines, selected from proposals through an open call for submissions, participate in a series of 'meetings without walls' hosted at our booth. By leveraging AAA's network, Open Platform supports researchers, curators, writers, artists, students, academics, and art organisations to further ongoing projects, catalyse new ones, or simply make connections. 

#AsiaArtArchive #OpenPlatform

Programme Schedule 

 

Friday 13 March
Read-In

Live Event | 69pm 
Participants are invited to read the material on display in the Asia Art Archive booth at Art Basel, and share their thoughts, images, and quotes through social media to collectively document the live inauguration of the uniquely built construction for AAA’s annual Open Platform programme.  

Host
Asia Art Archive

Participants
Public

Saturday 14 March
Disquieting Memories

Book Presentation & Conversation | 12pm 
Book presentation and conversation between Chinese artist Zhang Xiaogang, and AAA’s Jane DeBevoise and Anthony Yung on the forthcoming title, Disquieting Memories (Phaidon Press, 2015).

Host
Asia Art Archive with Phaidon Press

Language
Chinese with English translation

Participants
Zhang Xiaogang, Artist, China
Jane DeBevoise, AAA Chair of the Board of Directors
Anthony Yung, AAA Senior Researcher
 

In 15 Years

34pm
The art world has dramatically changed since Asia Art Archive’s founding 15 years ago. What will the art world look like in 2030? What will be the role of individual initiatives and independent art spaces?  How will art and ideas be created, communicated, shared, and preserved?  Will the digital replace the physical?  What new models of support will emerge, define, and shift the course of what is to come? 

Host
Jane DeBevoise, AAA Chair of the Board of Directors

 

Affordable Art Basel, Part II: The Vernissage

Live Event | 4:307:30pm 
Initiated by Hong Kong Urban Laboratory, the Affordable Art Basel project seeks to intervene into the relationships between Hong Kong residents, local artists, and an art fair through direct engagement. Participating artists will discuss how an art fair presents an opportunity for the public to exchange ideas on pedagogy.

Hosts
Helen Fan & Sampson Wong
Co-Directors, Hong Kong Urban Laboratory

Language
Cantonese

Participants
http://www.urbanlab.org.hk/projects/aab.htm
 

Sunday 15 March
Sustaining Cultural Histories in Public Space

121:30pm
In a city famous for constant growth, is there any of the ‘old’ Hong Kong left? This session will expand the dialogue beyond local applications to a global scale: how do we sustain cultural practices and histories in mass-oriented, static, and commercialised public spaces? What roles do urban planning, public art, historical preservation, and tourism play?

Host
Erika Wong
Founding Partner, Espace Memorae

Participants
Aric Chen, Curator, Design and Architecture, M+ Museum of Visual Culture, Hong Kong
Maria Chiaki, Director/Founding Partner, Espace Memorae, Hong Kong
Cecilia Chu, Assistant Professor of Urban Planning and Design, Hong Kong University
Lee Hoyin, Director, Architectural Conservation Programmes, Hong Kong University
Eunice Seng, Associate Professor of Architecture, Hong Kong University
Thomas Zhang, Associate Professor of Architecture, Hong Kong University

The Digital Revolution

2:304pm
To help inaugurate the new dedicated art app, Planet Art, UBS invites experts from digitally-based art businesses to discuss how the digital world is transforming the art market. The dialogue will consider the challenges and benefits, alongside its application as an effective tool for the promotion, sale, and exchange of knowledge.

Host
Stephen McCoubrey
Curator APAC, UBS Art Collection

Participants
Shea Goli, Specialist, Contemporary Art, Paddle8
David Smith, AAA Head of Digital
Sureyya Wille, Gallery Partnerships Manager Head of Asia and Middle East, Artsy

Shaping the Paper Cloud: Library as Form

4:306pm
The ‘white cube’ is quickly transforming into the ‘blank page’ as artists, curators, writers, and other cultural practitioners continue to use printed matter as a site for their work. What potential does art in print, and by extension, libraries and archives, hold in the production, intervention, and dissemination of art?  

Host
Ingrid Chu, Public Programmes Curator, Asia Art Archive

Participants
Pablo HelgueraArtist and Educator, New York
Kit-long Lam, AAA Library Acquisitions Coordinator
Marysia Lewandowska, Artist and 2015 AAA Resident
Christian Wassmann, Principal, Studio Christian Wassmann, New York
Chantal Wong, AAA Strategy and Special Projects
 

Monday 16 March
 
2020: A Society Led by the Arts

121:30pm
How can the Arts be instilled in the development of society? Cultural organisations and individuals who share a commitment to youth leadership discuss what kind of platform is needed for young people to contribute toward a society led by the Arts in 2020.  

Host
Meijing He, Head of Arts and Creative Industry, British Council
Susanna Chung, AAA Head of Learning and Participation

Participants
Joseph Chan, Founding Director, ComTale Ltd.; HKU Lecturer; ACLP Fellow, Hong Kong
Kattie Fan, Director, ifva, Hong Kong Arts Centre
Hazel Kwok & Erin Li, Committee Members, AAA PageNEXT
Ian Li, General Manager, Roundtable Community, Hong Kong
Ricky Yeung, AAA Artist Educator Resident


Searching in Tongues

2:153:45pm
Researchers, curators, writers, and scholars explore issues of translation and the circulation of knowledge amongst nascent centres of knowledge production, including the varied ways discourse travels in different languages. The informal discussion is conceived as a way to exchange ideas and models between individuals and institutions from Indonesia, India, China, and beyond.

Host
Hammad Nasar, AAA Head of Research and Programmes

Participants
Leeza Ahmady, Director, Asian Contemporary Art Week, New York
Deena Chalabi, Associate Curator of Public Dialogue, SFMOMA, San Francisco
Isabel Ching, Independent Curator & Writer, Heidelberg
Natasha Ginwala, Independent Curator, Researcher & Writer
Pablo Helguera, Artist and Educator, New York
Pitra Hutomo, Acting Director, Indonesian Visual Art Archive (IVAA)
Tina Pang, Curator, M+ Museum of Visual Culture, Hong Kong
Robin Peckham, Independent Curator; Chief Editor, The Art Newspaper Hong Kong; and Deputy Editor, LEAP, Beijing
Aaron Seeto, Director, Gallery 4A, Sydney


 
Common : Ground

4:306pm
The ‘Umbrella Movement’, also known as ‘Occupy Central’, began taking shape in September 2014, and the various Occupy sites became spaces for imagination, experimentation, creativity, and a means to invent an alternative future for Hong Kong. What does the future hold now that the occupation has ended? Can working toward the ‘commons’ be part of a transformative process? How might collaborations between artists, curators, and cultural practitioners activate this shift?

Host
Zoë Marden, artist & curator, London

Participants
Elaine W. Ho, Initatior, Homeshop, Beijing
Nicole Lai, AAA Digital Collections Coordinator
Tang Kwok Hin, Artist, Hong Kong
Marysia Lewandowska, Artist and 2015 AAA Resident
Sampson Wong, Umbrella Movement Visual Archive and Research Collective (UMVARC), Hong Kong
Yang Yeung, Founder, Soundpocket, Hong Kong


Tuesday 17 March
 
Found Photography and Fictional Narratives

121:30pm
This session aims to explore the use of found photography as a serial creative language, and the possibilities for reinterpreting images through art using varied points of personal reference, while also addressing the assembling and printing of images in artist books and related publications.

Host
Cristina Sanchez-Kozyreva, Editor-in-Chief & Co-Founder, Pipeline

Participants
Warren Leung Chi Wo, Artist, Hong Kong
Enin Supriyanto, Writer and Curator, Indonesia
Charwei Tsai, Artist, Taiwan
Hajra Waheed, Artist, India
Michelle Wong, AAA Researcher
Sarah Wong, Artist, Hong Kong


 
Digital Geographies: Net Art in China

1:453.15pm
Practitioners and supporters of digital art in China converse about the country’s unique digital landscape, and the rise of net art practices within an insular, patrolled space. Session participants also discuss the documentation of these practices and the possibilities for net-based artists to move beyond certain signifiers and boundaries.

Host
Laura Tucker, Independent Researcher, Beijing

Participants
Samantha Culp, Writer, Curator, and Co-founder, Paloma Powers, Shanghai
Gabriel de Seta, Artist and Scholar, Hong Kong
Ying Miao, Artist, Beijing
Michelle Proskell, Independent researcher, Curator, Artist, netize.net, Beijing
Chantal Wong, AAA Strategy and Special Projects



Cultural Residencies in China

3:305pm
With over 40 residency programs across greater China that provide artists with the time and space to create, experiment, and explore, the administrators of these independent art spaces seldom meet to discuss their shared missions, challenges, successes, and aspirations. This session invites the directors of various cultural residencies throughout China to gather and exchange ideas.

Host
Kira Simon-Kennedy, Programme Manager, China Residencies

Participants
Thea Baumann, Founding Director/CEO, Metaverse Makeovers, Shanghai
Anna Eschbach, Founder, Curator & Director, I: project space, Beijing
Ingrid Chu, AAA Public Programmes Curator
Brian Wallace, Founder, Red Gate Residency, Beijing
Christina Li, Incoming Director, Spring Workshop, Hong Kong

 

 

Presented by

Asia Art Archive

Supported by

Elaine & Anto Marden, Wendy Lee & Stephen Li and Lavina & William Lim

Design Partners

Studio Christian Wassmann and Francesca Grassi, New York, in conjunction with Sky Yutaka Ltd., Hong Kong

Special Thanks

Art Basel

In-kind Support

Walk in Hong Kong
 

 

Relevant content

Zhang Xiaogang: Disquieting Memories
Zhang Xiaogang: Disquieting Memories
Artist Monograph

Zhang Xiaogang: Disquieting Memories

Gary G. XU, 徐鋼, Jonathan FINEBERG
2015