2013

I THINK IT RAINS

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May 17, 2013 - Jun 30, 2013
@1a space

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Burger Collection is pleased to announce the launch of a three-year exhibition and research project developed and realized with 1a space, an independent artist-run organization. The project represents a further instalment of theQuadrilogy by Burger Collection. The project will open in May 2013 with the multi-disciplinary exhibition I Think It Rains at the heritage site of the Cattle Depot Artist Village in Hong Kong. It will feature some 20 artists and writers from Hong Kong and abroad.

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

I Think It Rains brings together artists, writers, and critics invited by

Burger Collection and 1a space in a tentative of creating a cross-disciplinary collaborative model.

The collaboration began to coalesce in November 2012 when the core-groups of 1a space and Burger Collection, consisting of the artists Enoch Cheung and Choi Yan-chi, curator Daniel Kurjaković and writer Cally Yu, embarked on more formal conversations. Early gatherings addressed the question of how to create a meaningful context of presentation, at this juncture in time, for diverse artistic approaches of a more experimental nature. The core-groups’ dialogs revolved around the issue of how to construct a platform allowing participants to progressively develop, re-examine, and transform their contributions. Plotted as a platform for sustainable activities, an overall time frame of three years was set. Within this frame, the project aims at developing one possible mode of collaboration, connecting a local and an international organization, which are both mindful of the cultural specificity of Hong Kong and of transnational currents of contemporary artistic practice. According to artist Choi Yan-chi, the project proposes to “set up parameters to activate loose teams of art practitioners for on-going dialogs and discussions about various models of cultural production.”

In its first year of activities under the roof of Burger Collection’s Quadrilogy, the project will, according to curator Daniel Kurjaković, look at “how artists have developed succinct ways to question the relationships between history and histories, cognitive patterns and social behavior in the present and impulses for the future. Artists have been keen on underlining the artistic process by using various sorts of research that seamlessly link or interestingly contrast different temporal levels.” The first exhibition, I Think It Rains, will emphasize the multi-faceted practices of the participating artists and writers ranging from mixed-media work to installations, pseudo-writing, or radio-programs, and the like. 

I Think It Rains will take place on the premises of the Cattle Depot Artist Village, a heritage site located in the raw and unpolished environment of the old town center of Kowloon, providing a unique venue for alternative works to happen. It will consist of new and existing works by artists from Hong Kong and abroad, spreading out in the various spaces of the Cattle Depot as well as in the public area. Performances and multi-functional project rooms will supplement the exhibition. A full day of performances and happenings, both inside the Cattle Depot and in the adjacent urban area of Mong Kok, will enable visitors to experience the exhibition on the backdrop of various real-time events. The launch will also see the presentation of the first issue of the magazineTorrent (due out in April 2013), introduced by Burger Collection last year, and will include, amongst others, various artists’ contributions, and an in-depth conversation about art production in Hong Kong.

The first phase of the project, unfolding from May to December 2013, will be rounded off with a second edition of the exhibition, which will start in autumn. Its major components will consist in artist residencies, panels and workshops, as well as the production of ephemera and a catalog documenting the yearlong productions.

The title I Think It Rains is borrowed from the homonymic poem by Nigerian poet Wole Soyinka. Rather than circumscribing a topic or theme, the title points to some of the motifs of the project: a sense of physical actuality and sensuality, of details and multiplicity, of a continuous present, of a porous quality of space as well as of the relations between the imaginary and the material.

LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS (as of February 2013)

Artists and Writers: Bani Abidi, Fiona Banner, Pierre Bismuth, Muhanned Cader, Filipa César, Alejandro Cesarco, Enoch Cheung, Pak Sheung Chuen, Choi Yan-chi, Ng Ka Chun, Chow Yiu Fai, Ryan Gander, Florian Germann, Gao Weigang, Jon Kessler, Kingsley Ng, Lam Tung Pang, Lau Ching Ping, Vittorio Santoro, Fiete Stolte, Annie Lai-kuen Wan, and Cally Yu.Core team members of Burger Collection and 1a space: Choi Yan-chi, Enoch Cheung, Linda Jensen, Daniel Kurjaković, and Cally Yu.A final list of participants and contributing artists exhibited will be published by April 2013.

SAVE THE DATE

Launch exhibition
May 16: Opening of the exhibition I Think It Rains (May 17 – June 30, 2013)
May 23: Launch of Torrent Magazine n° 1
May 24: Performance Day Daily VIP receptions at 11am and guided tours at 5pm during the week of the Hong Kong Basel Art Fair.

Follow-up exhibition
October 17: Opening of the second exhibition (October 18 – December 15, 2013)

Details available upon request.The program will be updated on:

www.quadrilogy.org .

SITE

The Cattle Depot Artist Village, located in To Kwa Wan, Hong Kong, is the main site for the project and a fixture in the Hong Kong art world. Cattle Depot is a heritage site amidst the old town center of Kowloon. Since years, it houses various artist run organizations and cultural producers, such as Videotage, Zuni, Artist Commune, and On-and-On Theatre. 1a space has been on site since 2001. More here: www.oneaspace.org.hk

QUADRILOGY

The Hong Kong project, jointly conceived and realized by Burger Collection and 1a space, is the second installment of the Quadrilogy, the on-going exhibition and research program by the Burger Collection. It initially started in Berlin in 2009 with an exhibition and public programs entitledConflicting Tales. More here: www.quadrilogy.org  and www.burgercollection.org