HOMELAND in TRANSIT
Through the Clouds
Luke Ching, Yim Sui Fong, Lo Lai Lai Natalie
kuratiert von Angelika Li
Videos aus Hongkong im Kunstfenster
4. Juni bis 22. Juli 2021
Installation
Sa/So 10./11. & 17./18.7.2021
13-17h
Homeland in Transit is a curatorial series by curator Angelika Li.
Originating from Hong Kong she is interested in the essence of local culture, heritage and valued stories, and driving a continuous dialogue between local and international communities.
Four videos by three artists are giving an atmospheric impression of Hong Kong and its actual conditions.
In the course of July 2021 the video screening will be enlarged by two special installations, which can be visited physically at the Wolkenhof.
The date will be communicated by a later time depending on the pandemic situation.
English text by Angelika Li - please scroll down
Homeland in Transit ist eine Ausstellungsreihe der aus Hongkong stammenden Kuratorin Angelika Li.
Seit der Eröffnung der ersten Ausstellung im Jahr 2019 war die Welt mit dramatischen Veränderungen konfrontiert. Dies hat die Bedeutung des Titels „Homeland in Transit“ in vieler Hinsicht erweitert. In der besonderen Lage des Jahrs 2020 setzte Li daher die Segel zur Fortsetzung einer Expedition, die den Kräften des Wassers folgend – einem charakteristischen Element Hongkongs – durch Themen wie Migration, Suche nach dem Selbst oder menschliche Resilienz navigiert.
2021 erreicht diese Expedition „ein Fenster inmitten der Welt“, welches als hybrider Ausstellungsort sowohl virtuell im Internet besucht werden kann, als auch real am Wolkenhof.
Die Wolken, im Namen des Ortes, werden zum Ausgangspunkt für einen Transit in den Kreislauf des Wassers; in Wolken, Wind und Regen als metaphorischen Raum. Die grenzenlose Natur der Wolken diente seit je und in allen Kulturen als Quelle künstlerischer Inspiration. Ihr fliessendes Spiel mit Wind und Wetter steht für Hoffnung, für die Schönheit des Augenblicks, für Transformation, aber auch für Vergänglichkeit, Unvorhersehbarkeit, Ausgeliefertsein und Machtlosigkeit.
Mit „Through the Clouds“ präsentiert Angelika Li eine Hongkonger Perspektive: Wie begegnen die Künstler*innen Luke Ching, Yim Sui Fong und Lo Lai Lai den gegenwärtigen Transformationen, um nicht zu sagen Turbulenzen?
Vier Videoarbeiten fügen sich zu einem Stimmungsbild.
Im Verlauf des Juli 21 wird – abhängig von der Coronasituation – die Videopräsentation um eine Rauminstallation erweitert, die vor Ort am Wolkenhof besucht werden kann.
Homeland in Transit wird im Juli 2021 nach Berlin weiterreisen zu Momentum im Kunstquartier Bethanien
https://www.momentumworldwide.org
HOMELAND in TRANSIT Through the Clouds
by Angelika Li
In the short time since the inaugural exhibition of “Homeland in Transit” in 2019, our world has changed dramatically and each word in this title has developed a wider scope of meaning and expanded relevance. In the extraordinary situations of 2020, we set sail along the forces of water – an intrinsic and characteristic element of Hong Kong – through the notions of migration, self-searching and our human resilience to further our expedition.
In 2021, we arrive at Ein Fenster inmitten der Welt, a window in the middle of the world situated in a natural reserve forest area near Stuttgart, with two interfaces: one to the real world, one to the virtual. The physical location of the exhibition is at a house in Wolkenhof built by Heinrich von Zügel (1850-1941), a founding member of the Munich Secession and pioneer of German Impressionism in 19th century. During that time, Wolkenhof was a meeting place for artists and the name literally means 'Clouds Court' in German.
The environment of Wolkenhof and its name serve as points of departure for this transit through the dynamics of the hydrological cycle: clouds, wind and rain. The boundless nature of clouds has inspired many in the arts across different cultures. Cloud appears in many poets’ work including ‘I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud’ (1798) by English poet William Wordsworth (1770-1850) who personifies himself as a melancholic cloud that aimlessly drifts ‘high o’er vales and hills’. His poem illustrates that we do not realise the significance of the simplest things until they are gone forever. By using daffodils as a metaphor for the voice of Nature, the poet reminds humankind of its restorative power and value. Are the clouds floating in hopes that they will discover fulfillment in life? In a very different context and in his tempestuous style, Chinese poet Xu Zhimo (1897-1831) opens his poem ‘By Chance’ (1926) with ‘I am a cloud in the sky…’, expressing the inevitable nature and qualities of change, unpredictability and impermanence between the cloud and water, I and you, ‘the sea in the darkness’ and ‘the glow that sparked between us as we crossed our paths’. The clouds lightly float in the sky, yet their movements, direction or destination cannot be decided according to its own will, without other forces, such as the wind.
The sense of floatingness and helplessness echoes Hong Kong novelist Xi Xi’s (1937-) ‘The Floating City’ (1986), with René Magritte’s ‘The Castle of the Pyrenees’ (1959) on a big rock suspending in the air above a rough sea as the visual imagery accompanying the opening chapter. The imagery accentuates the feeling of loneliness, isolation, rootlessness and escape: ‘The floating city appeared suddenly before everyone’s eye in the middle of sky like a hydrogen-filled balloon on a clear, bright day many years ago. Rolling clouds swirled by above; waves crashed on the swelling sea below…There had been a violent collision of clouds lighting up the sky with flashes and roars of thunder…Suddenly the floating city had dropped from the clouds and hung in midair.’ The floating city and its people have no control over their destiny, they can only fluctuate as external factors change.
Soon after she received the Cikada Prize in 2019, Xi Xi spoke in an interview with Hong Kong Economic Journal about her recent observation on Hong Kong: ‘the reality now is way more surreal than any fiction.’ From Hong Kong perspectives, how do artists Luke Ching, Yim Sui Fong and Lo Lai Lai Nathalie perceive the transformations, if not turbulences? Four video works and two planned installations have been selected for this exhibition. Wordsworth’s allegory might invoke contemplation on the disappearance of things dear to us. Are we going through a test to our resilience in unpredictable environments? Are we staying within the new realities or breaking through? Are we like clouds, going where the wind blows, by chance?
