A Hong Kong - Melbourne Exchange Project 2003
Organisation for Cultural Exchange and Mishap (OCEM)
(中文新聞稿)

Enactment Dates:
27.06.2003 – 27.07.2003 Para/Site Art Space, Hong Kong
4.07.2003 – 26.07.2003 West Space, Melbourne Australia

Opening Reception (Para/Site): 6-8pm, Fri, 27 June 2003
Discussion Forum (Para/Site): 3pm, Sat, 28 June 2003

Gallery Hours: 12 –7pm, Wed to Sun (Closed Mon & Tue and Public Holidays)
Location: Para/Site Art Space, G/F, 2 Po Yan St, Sheung Wan, HK (near 224 Hollywood Rd)

Organisation founding members: Brett Jones (AUS) & Jaspar K.W. Lau (HK)
Organisation artist members:
Australia — Janina Green, Raafat Ishak, Patrick Pound
Hong Kong — LAW Man-lok, LEUNG Chin-fung, LEUNG Mee-ping, SO Yan-kei

Organisation for Cultural Exchange and Mishap (OCEM) comes out of an ongoing relationship between two artist-run spaces: West Space in Melbourne and Para/Site Art Space in Hong Kong. Launched by Jaspar K.W. Lau (Hong Kong) and Brett Jones (Australia), the exhibition will be held in Hong Kong and Melbourne respectively.

Based on the concept of a cultural exchange organisation, OCEM is not an Organisation in the sense of having an administrative infrastructure or a delineated institutional voice, but rather is a fluid composite of practice as enacted by artwork, documents and dialogue developed over an immeasurable length of time.

OCEM is interested in organisation, and not organization as institution. OCEM understands the primacy of artist-initiated activity. The members of Organisation at any point in time will be the organisation. This project has no aims beyond allowing artists to develop their own aims and objectives for Organisation. Organisation recognizes that these aims and objectives are developed via a process of organisation by member artists, and are therefore also subject to change and negation by member artists. The aims and objectives of Organisation are subservient to, and a direct result of imagining and enacting scenarios to do with organisation. It understands practice as a series of layered negotiations with social and cultural formations constituted through a radical critique of these constructs through play and subversion.

OCEM involves three Australian and four Hong Kong artists in a cross-cultural dialogue that attempts to exercise the scenario and enactment of Organization cultural exchange and mishap, reframe some of the issues surrounding trans/cultural practices, epitomised in the booming international exhibition circuit, international biennales and artist residency programs. In this sense it aims to consider why cultural exchange projects are regarded as important and how they affect and engage with participants in different cultural contexts.

For more information, please contact Leung Po-shan or Man Wai-Kwang at Para/Site Art Space, Tel: (852) 2517-4620 / e-mail: parasite@netvigator.com.

Images / Photos : O-C-E-M of found images

- Biographies -

- Hong Kong Participants -

LEUNG Mee-ping (Artist)
Leung Mee-ping, b. 1961 Hong Kong, graduated from L’Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts a Paris, France in 1991, and gained her MFA from the California Institute of Arts, USA in 2000. Last year she received the Hong Kong Contemporary Art Biennial Award and this year obtained the Starr Foundation Fellowship. Her solo shows include: The Hong Kong Contemporary - Water Tone: 1991-2002, Kaoshsiung Fine Art Museum, Taiwan (2003); Memorize the Future, HK City Hall, HK (2002); and Close at a Distance, Lime Gallery, LA, USA (2000). Group shows include: Sharjah International Biennial, Sharjah Museum of Art, U.A.E (2003); Forms, NUS Museum, Singapore (2003); Asian Comments, Horn-Lorn-Speaker-Park, Denmark (2002); and Over Here (There), Guggenheim Gallery, USA (2001).

SO Yan-kei (Artist)
So Yan-kei, b. 1969 Hong Kong, graduated from Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She has won several awards including the Asian Cultural Council Fellowship, New York City, USA (2001); the Freeman Foundation Asian Artist Award, Vermont, USA (1999); and the Hong Kong Contemporary Art Biennial Award, HK Museum of Art, HK (1998). Recent solo exhibitions include: 11, UCLA Sculpture Garden, LA, USA (2002); Can You Hear Me? Maastricht Central Station, Netherlands (2000); White Ink Installation Works by So Yan-kei, Para/Site Art Space, HK (2000); and Installation by So Yan-kei, Vermont, USA (1999). Group exhibitions include: a recent show at Track 16 Gallery, Los Angeles (2003); Open 2001, Venice Biennial, Italy (2001); Atopie, Voormalig Bonnefanten Museum, Netherlands (2000); and Hide and Seek, Mizuma Art Gallery, Tokyo, Japan (2000).

LEUNG Chin-fung (Artist)
Leung Chin-fung, b. 1977 Hong Kong, received his BA in Arts (Fine Arts) from The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2001. He has participated in several exhibitions including: Wall to Window, 1a Space, HK (2002); Social Club, Para/Site Art Space, HK (2002); The New Contemporaries - Exhibition of a New Generation of Hong Kong Artists, Artists Commune, HK (2002); What a Mess! Hui’s Cultural Gallery, Chinese University of HK (2001); and City Laioli, Fringe Gallery, Central, HK (2001).

LAW Man-lok (Artist)
Law Man-lok, b. 1978 Hong Kong, is currently working as an Assistant Curator. He graduated in Fine Arts from The Chinese University of Hong Kong in 2001. Exhibitions include: The New Contemporaries - Exhibition of a New Generation of HK Artists, Artists Commune, HK (2002); City Laioli, Fringe Gallery, Central, HK (2001); and the Nokia Arts Awards Asia Pacific, where he won Merit Awards in 1999 and again in 2001. He was also a Finalist in the Italian Trade Commission for “Art on Feet", International Art Competition (2000); a Global Communications Finalist for the Philippe Charriol Arts Awards (1999).

LAU Kin-wah (Curator)
Lau Kin-wah, b.1971 Hong Kong, graduated from the Fine Arts Dept of The CUHK in 1993. His interest in the relationship between modernity, aesthetics and contemporary arts started while working as a research assistant for the Comparative Study of Cultural Traditions Programme within the Research Institute of The Humanities at the CUHK. He has worked as an independent contributor of arts and cultural criticism since 1999, with articles and essays appearing in Hong Kong and Taiwan press, academic journals and various exhibition catalogues. He has also been a guest editor for Para/Site exhibition projects and P/S (Para-Site quarterly magazine). In 2000, he curated Die Ambivalenz for Hong Kong Goethe Institute; and in 2001, the QI QIAO WEN BEN (Texts Tangram) / Stretcher Exhibition for painter Lui Chun Kwong. Lau was among the official Study Group for the Hong Kong ADC participation in the 49th Venice Biennale (2001), and is currently a member of the "Para/Site Collective" (Hong Kong representatives) for the 50th Venice Biennale (2003).

- Australian Participants -

Janina Green (Artist)
Green studied Fine Arts at the Melbourne University, and at the Victoria College, Prahran. She completed a Diploma of Art (majoring in Printmaking) at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne in 1965, and has been a reviewer for The Melbourne Times for the past five years. Currently she is a lecturer in Photography at the Victorian College of the Arts. Major recent solo exhibitions include: Gratitude, Gippsland Art Gallery, Sale (2002); Plantation, Stills Gallery, Sydney (2001); and Scooping Up the Moon at Plum Creek, Smyrnios Gallery, Melbourne (1997). Green has also shown extensively in group exhibitions, and has been represented in numerous collections, including: the Australian National Gallery, Canberra; National Gallery of Victoria; State Library of Victoria; and the Pat Corrigan Collection. Several prizes include the CCP Salon Award (1993); Albury National Photographic Award (1999); and residency at the Austin & Repatriation Hospital (1999).

Patrick Pound (Artist)
Born in New Zealand in 1962, Pound emigrated to Australia in 1989 and received Australian citizenship in 1991. He graduated from the Auckand University in 1987, receiving a BFA with a double major in Art History. He has won prizes for Excellence in Art History, Auckland University (1986); a Senior Art History Prize, Auckland University (1986); and the Elam School of Fine Arts, Auckland University Prize (1986). Recent solo exhibitions include shows at Herring Island, Melbourne (with Lyndell Brown/ Charles Green, 2002); CCP, Melbourne (2002); and Auckland City Art Gallery (2001). Pound has also shown extensively in over 50 group exhibitions including most recently in 2002: Breaks, Govett Brewster Gallery, New Plymouth; Sanctuary 2, Victorian College of the Arts Gallery, Melbourne; Stranger Than Truth, Australian Centre for Photography, Sydney; and Good Work - the Jim Barr and Mary Barr Collection, City Gallery, Wellington. His works have been collected by the National Gallery Victoria; Auckland City Art Gallery; Dunedin Art Gallery; and the Museum of New Zealand, as well as other numerous public and private collections in Australia and abroad.

Raafat Ishak (Artist)
Born in Cairo Egypt in 1967, Ishak moved to Melbourne in 1982. He is currently studying post graduate studies in Architecture (History and Conservation Practice) at the University of Melbourne. Solo exhibitions include: River Problem, Townhouse Gallery of Contemporary Art, Cairo (2002); Good Ship, PB Gallery, Prahran, Melbourne (2000); Gone Good Government, 1/F, Fitzroy, Melbourne (1999); Correction, Lovers Gallery, Fitzroy, Melbourne (1999); and On Work, Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia (1997). Several group exhibitions include: Fieldwork, National Gallery of Victoria (2003); It's a Beautiful Day, Ian Potter Museum of Art, Melbourne (2002); and Office of Utopic Procedures, West Space, Melbourne (2001). In 2001, he took part in several collaborations: One Boat Two Boats, with Ole Yurgen Ness, First Floor, Melbourne; Fan Flag, with Sean Loughrey, Ocular Lab, Melbourne; Mary Mary Fire Walk With Me, with Jonathan Nichols, West Space, Melbourne.

Brett Jones (Curator)
Brett Jones, b.1967 Melbourne, has worked across several disciplines and integrates his art practice into many of his professional pursuits. These include being the co-founder and chair of West Space Inc.; managing editor of Dialogue magazine (1994-1999); lecturing in design at Monash University (1999-2002); arts consultancy work; and writing on artists’ issues. He has initiated and co-ordinated numerous projects including publications such as Artists Talk (2000); Interviews with Artists/Artist-run Spaces (1998 and 2003); Office of Utopic Procedures (2002); and exhibitions such as Working in Collaboration (1996); Transaction (1998); Out of Place (1999); and Harmonia (2000). He has completed BA, Fine Art (Monash University, 1988), Post-Graduate Dip, Fine Arts (VCA, 1990), Bachelor of Design, Industrial Design (RMIT, 1994), and Master of Design (RMIT, 1996). Brett has exhibited since 1990 at spaces including West Space, Platform, CCP, Linden, Para/Site Art Space Hong Kong, Annandale Galleries, CCP, Ian Potter Gallery. With Sarah Stubbs he has received grants from Arts Victoria and the Australia Council. Brett is Program Manager of Art and Design Studies at Monash College.