In Conversation with 2016 Asia Society Arts Game Changers
VIEW EVENT DETAILSAfternoon Discussion with CAI GUO-QIANG, YOSHITOMO NARA
Afternoon Discussion with Artists CAI GUO-QIANG, YOSHITOMO NARA
Registration 12:45pm;
Program 1:00 - 3:30pm
In conversation with Cai Guo-qiang: 1:00pm; In conversation with Yoshitomo Nara: 14:00
*Conducted in Japanese, Mandarin and English with English and Mandarin simultaneous interpretation
The Asia Art Awards is a signature event honoring the Asia Arts Game Changers during the week of Art Basel in Hong Kong during the week of Art Basel in Hong Kong. Major art collectors from the region, artists, gallerists, dignitaries from the art world, and Asia Society Trustees and patrons will gather on March 20, 2016 to honor artists Cai Guo-Qiang, Nalini Malani, and Yoshitomo Nara for their significant contributions to contemporary art. Join us the afternoon following the exclusive event for an opportunity to meet with the new cohort of honorees artists, Yoshitomo Nara and Cai Guo-qiang, at a conversation with Dr. Yeewan Koon, Associate Professor, Fine Arts Department, The University of Hong Kong, and Michelle Yun, Senior Curator, Modern and Contemporary Art, Asia Society Museum.
Cai Guo-qiang, one of the most iconic artists working today, is best known for his signature explosion events. Cai’s multidisciplinary practice draws upon eastern philosophies and socio-political issues to facilitate an exchange between the viewer and the larger universe around them. The artist was born in Quanzhou, China, and studied stage design at the Shanghai Theatre Academy. Cai has been the subject of numerous international solo exhibitions, including “Cai Guo-Qiang—An Explosion Event: Light Cycle Over Central Park” (2003) at Asia Society Museum, as well as a part of such seminal group exhibitions as Asia Society’s “Inside Out: New Chinese Art” (1998). He has been the recipient of many honors including the Barnett Newman Grant Award (2015), U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts (2012), the Praemium Imperiale (2012), the Fukuoka Arts & Culture Prize (2009), and the Golden Lion at the 48th Venice Biennale (1999). The artist served as Director of Visual and Special Effects for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
Yoshitomo Nara was born in Hirosaki, Aomori, Japan, in 1959. He completed his Master's Degree at Aichi Prefectural University of Fine Arts and Music in 1987. The following year, Nara studied with A. R. Penck at Kunstakademie Düsseldorf in Germany and earned the title of Meisterschüler. He lived and worked in Cologne from 1994 to 2000, and was a guest professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1998. The artist lived and worked in Tokyo after returning to Japan in 2000, and later relocated to Tochigi in 2005. Through his expressive depictions of children and animals ranging from paintings and drawings, to three-dimensional works employing FRP, ceramic, bronze, and large-scale installations, Nara continues to attract audiences internationally and is one of Japan’s most iconic artists of our time. In 2010, Asia Society Museum presented the first major New York exhibition of his work, “Yoshitomo Nara: Nobody’s Fool,” and in 2015, the Asia Society Hong Kong Center held his first major solo exhibition in Hong Kong, “Life is Only One.”
(Photo: Black Eyed, 2014, Yoshitomo Nara.)
Yeewan Koon is an Associate Professor in the Department of Fine Arts at The University of Hong Kong. Her primary research area is late imperial Chinese art with a secondary focus on modern and contemporary art in China and Hong Kong. In 2014, she was the guest curator of the exhibition It Begins with Metamorphosis: Xu Bing at Asia Society, Hong Kong Center. She is also the recipient of numerous research grants and is currently working on her new project, The Conceit of the Copy in Chinese Art.
Michelle Yun is Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at Asia Society Museum where she oversees the museum’s initiatives in modern and contemporary visual art by Asian and Asian American artists. Appointed in 2012, Yun specializes in Chinese contemporary art and diaspora artists. In addition to planning and implementing the museum’s modern and contemporary exhibitions, she also manages and builds the Museum’s contemporary art collection, initiated in 2007. Yun is currently co-organizing a retrospective exhibition for the celebrated modernist painter Zao Wou-Ki scheduled to open at Asia Society Museum in the fall of 2016. Yun was formerly curator of the Hunter College Art Galleries. She previously served as Project Director of Cai Guo-Qiang's studio and managed the artist’s mid-career retrospective at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum that traveled to the National Art Museum of China in Beijing as part of the cultural Olympiad in 2008.
In collaboration with
Event Details
Loke Yew Hall, 1/F, Main Building, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Road