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Treasures old, treasures new, treasures worth the pilgrimage to...Inspired by Channel 4’s ‘Four Rooms’* and my Blom & Blom recycled lighting piece for Phoenix Magazine, trawling for treasure has never been more fashionable. Here are 5 fantastic events where you just might get lucky

Hong Kong Freshly Brewed Blogs pt 1

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Reminiscing...V&A Postmodernism: Style and Subversion

Any self-respecting writer will have a library of rejected manuscripts (I remember how I cried on my first), buried inside cobweb gathering tombs of laptop hard drives, never to see the light of day and usually for a good reason.

I am not one of those self-respecting writers.

So here's an attempt at Art Review-worthy critcism from the 2011 archives. Frank feedback in the the comments box below the post would be most welcomed. The sharing icons are in grey above each post, which I still haven't figured out how to change...

I've written my fair share of embrassing, self-indulgent, juvenile rubbish, but reflection's the only way to learn right?

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Postmodernism: Style and Subversion, 1970-1990 at the V&A

(24^th September 2011- 8^th January 2012)

i-D, no 28. The Art Issue, August 1985, photograph by Nick Knight, featuring Lizzy Tear.V&A

Postmodernism: Style and Subversion is one of the VA’s most exciting projects to date. Divided into 3 sections- Architecture, Style and Money, it examines radical ideas that defined the movement between 1970- 1990. Its proliferation is chronicled through stimulating exhibits- from Architecture, Art and Design to Film, Music and Fashion. It’s ambitious to showcase a hotly contested movement, one which we are arguably still living in. I fell slept through Postmodernism lectures at university, so I was curious to understand what the fuss was about.

To some, it might be synonymous with Andy Warhol soup cans and Madonna’s fashion choices- but few are aware of its anti-modernist roots in architecture. Postmodernism is portrayed as a phoenix rising from the ashes of modernism in the 1970s, a liberation from its restrictive orthodoxies of function, clarity and purity. A full-scale replica of Hans Hollein’s façade (1980) from the Venice Biennale is one of the most theatrical exhibits. Each pillar samples a period in the history of architecture, from the Garden of Eden, classical Greek ruins to industrialist Art Deco. The pastiche is deliberate and unabashedly artificial (think Las Vegas novelty hotels); playfully cutting-up-and-pasting memorable fragments from the past.

The bricologe, cut-and-paste ethos was not limited to styles and ideas. It brought unconventional materials and different processes together to create a new synergy. This is evident in Paul Astbury’s ceramic sculpture, Box(1980). At first glance it’s an unremarkable, tatty white box hastily assembled with discarded scraps. The broken fragments are actually fired ceramic tiles, individually fixed with screws to the cardboard box, an unconventional mosaic tessellation. These are accented with strokes of custom blue and brown tinted araldite, sellotape, paint and felt tip markers. The complex layers and strategic placement of colours makes one wonder how much of its appearance is coincidental or deliberate. Personally, excavated remnants of demolished Modernist architecture come to mind, eschewing progress; suggesting the present is merely an amalgam of antiquity. It’s an intriguing, tactile synthesis of everyday materials; refreshingly contemporary even for today. 

Box, 'Untitled', Paul Astbury, 1980. V&A

The music and performance (style) section is not to be missed. The set (known as ‘The Club’) recreates the electric atmosphere of an underground fetish night club from 1980s, complete with coloured spotlights, elevated stages and wire fences. The kind your parents would not approve of. David Bowie, Grace Jones and other 80s pop videos repeat (annoyingly) on huge screens- charting MTV’s pivotal role of channelling postmodernism to the mainstream audience of style conscious youths.  David Byrne of Talking Heads’ Big Suit(1983) and Grace Jones’ cubist sculptural maternity dress (made of cardboard and felt in 1979) are just some of the zany outfits on display. Colourful, exaggerated appearances conveyed dissident, self-referential personas critical to these artists’ successes.

The most extreme style statements are perhaps the male and female ballet costumes designed by Leigh Bowery for the Michael Clark Company’s production, Because We Must(1987).  Beige balaclava-attached corset bodices are covered in exquisite crewelwork, depicting pink, orange, gold and green sequined flowers- reinterpreting an embroidery technique historically used for curtains. Complete with pink lycra sequinned leggings, I imagine it would make Lady Gaga blush. The mysteriously covered faces (with just 3 holes for sight and respiration) and sexually provocative corset-bodies fetishize domination and submission. Epitomising fluid postmodern gender identities, they bring a body-conscious, androgynous ‘otherness’ Bowery’s work was famous for. 

Dance costumes for performance 'Because We Must', designed by Leigh Bowery, 1987. V&A

The last section explores the impact of money on postmodernism during the economic and consumer excesses of the 1980s to its demise in 1990. The luxury products of ‘design editing’ are enticing, a precursor to the current trend for artist/designer/high street collaborations. It marks the change when designers happily merchandised their services to mass market brands like Disney and Alessi. An iconic example is architect Michael Graves’ Mickey Mouse Gourmet Collection(1991). A tea-set with mouse-shaped handles and whistling Mickey spout cover reflect a humorous, ironic self regard that defined pop culture. One can’t help but lament a ‘selling out’ for fame and profit, relinquishing the creative freedom postmodernists fought for in the first place. Money was power, but it also tainted postmodernism with a ‘vulgar decadence’ that still niggles, whether we admit or not.

For visitors unfamiliar with postmodernism, this is a dynamic introduction to its many ‘broken facets’. The ideas radical at the time shaped and continue to influence the world we live in today – from parody, pluralism, bricolage to a return to kitsch and nostalgia. There are too many objects for one to thoroughly evaluate; leaving many questions not fully answered (Is Postmodernism dead? Does it even matter?). However, like a time-travelling rollercoaster of unsettling, sensory thrills, it’s more fun to do a David Byrne and ‘Stop talking sense’.

The Discus Thrower’s New Clothes

Sui Jianguo's Discus thrower. Image: British Museum

The official fever of the London 2012 Olympics may have passed its watershed moment, but its Cultural Olympiad is set to become its most enduring legacy. Since 2008, 18 million have participated in 12000 projects across the country thus far. That’s not including the farm animals in Danny Boyle’s Opening Ceremony. From The World Shakespeare Festival (performing plays in 37 different languages) to Turner Prize winning-artist Jeremy Deller’s life-size Stonehenge bouncy castle, there’s been something for everyone. 

If it’s an authentic piece of ancient Olympic history you’re after however, the British Museum is a no-brainer.  Envied by museums worldwide for its stunning collection of Greek artefacts, to celebrate the Olympics it has curated Winning at the ancient Games, a free gallery trail of 12 sports -related objects. The tour includes of course, the prized Townley Discobolus, the Roman copy of Myron’s anatomically perfect discus thrower. However, inconspicuously tucked away from the Great Court’s flocks of tourists is Chinese contemporary artist Sui Jianguo’s interpretation of the Discobolus, which comes with an unexpected twist.  He is dressed in a traditional Chinese ‘Mao Suit’.

As one of China’s foremost practitioners of modern sculpture, Sui Jianguo rose to international fame in the late 1990s, for his bold Legacy Mantle cast-aluminium sculptures of ‘Mao suits’ (zhongshan jackets). A survivor of Mao’s Cultural Revolution, later witnessing the June 4th Movement, his experimental practice reflects China’s tumultuous cultural, social and political transition in the last half century. He now presides as head of sculpture at the prestigious China Central Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing.

The Townly Discobolus is undoubtedly one of the most famous images from the ancient world. Despite its popularity, it’s actually an incorrectly (albeit skilfully) restored forgery. The head is supposed to turn back at the discus, instead of facing the ground.  Having starred in Leni Riefenstahl’s acclaimed film Olympia (1938), to the London Transport poster of Britain’s 1948 Olympic Games, it’s been a universal symbol of freedom and democracy. 

One might presume Sui’s version to be carved in marble, like the museum’s resident discus thrower. In fact, it has been cast in bronze then painted white, using the same painstaking technique as Myron did 2500 years ago.

But how did Sui become interested in Western sculpture in the first place? Is it merely a frivolous but timely statement of Chinese-Western cultural exchange? For the artist, the seeds of classical inspiration were planted during the formative years as a sculpture student at Beijing’s Central Academy of Fine Arts in the late 1980s, when he first came across a plaster cast of a discus thrower. Contemporary sculpture in China was in its infantile development until the early 1990s. Studying the timeless figures by Michelangelo, Rodin alongside the icons of Chinese Buddhism-it was a time when the Western ideas were inevitably shaping China’s cultural map, a metamorphosis that is ongoing in Sui’s opinion.

In 1998, he made his first Mao-suit clad sculptures in painted fibreglass, a series titled Drapery Study. Despite the name, the collection was more suggestive of China’s long history of artistic censorship than analysing folds of fabric. This dates back to infamous burning of books by its First Emperor Qin Shi Huang in 246 BC.

In an earlier Frieze magazine review this year of his show at Pace Gallery (Beijing), a critic described Dying Slave (1998), part of the Drapery Study series, as “a deliberate appropriation of the realist sculptural technique, a reference to his own educational background, but with a biting critique of the political mechanism behind a nationwide aesthetic preference”1. Indeed, if you ever get to see it, it’s one of the most haunting images you’ll never forget.

Of course the talking point, be it the early Drapery Series or the featured Discobolus, is its choice of attire. To the Western imagination, the ‘Mao suit’ is an iconic image synonymous with China’s Communist three-decade reign under Mao Zedong. To the Chinese people however, the connotations are far more ambivalent. The clothing’s restrained design seems to mirror the government’s tight control over its people, emphasising unwavering unity, respect and patriotism. Until as recently as 1990, it was a mandatory business suit worn by officials, as well as most of the male population. Like the unravelling of its traditions, its popularity amongst the younger generation fell as western influences sparked a fashion revolution.

But how does the work fit into today’s context? In terms of accepted styles, concepts and education systems, the liberalisation of art in China has come a long way since Mao’s death, along with rapid modernisation and globalization. Yet there is still progress to be made, international dialogues to be opened and Sui believes adapting Western thinking may be the answer.

Personally, the suit’s symbolism of conformity resonates (unwittingly or not), with the curious fact that the Discobolus formed the basis of the Nazis’ ‘Master Race Ideology’ in 1938. As strange as it sounds, I was subconsciously hesitant to touch the clothed, contemporary version. 

For the sake of enjoyment, I prefer to take a light-hearted view of Sui’s Discobolus. It still bears the thought-provoking ambiguity of Myron’s original. Nevertheless, to some it’s a poignant reminder of the liberties the Western societies so often take for granted.  

Sui Jianguo’s discus thrower (1 June – 9 September 2012)
British Museum
http://www.britishmuseum.org/

1. Quote by Carol Yinghua Lu, Frieze, 22nd May 2012, http://www.frieze.com/issue/print_back/sui-jianguo/