The Third Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art
Immediately after a presentation by curator Jean-Hubert Martin about his current project for the Musée National d'Art Moderne - an exhibition of decorated skulls from around the world which seeks to reassert the spiritual under?pinnings of the Modern art museum - Papuan artist Michael Mel told a funny story about the horrified reactions of a Western audience on hearing that a group of visiting missionaries to New Guinea were eaten by locals. 'But at least', he said, 'these people had a taste of religion'. The academic tone of the conference only thinly veiled the shocking key-terms of this exchange: religion, death, bones, cannibalism, culture. It was a reminder of the high stakes precipitated by the cultural intermix of the last 20 years.
Of course, Martin's 'Magiciens de la Terre' for the Pompidou in 1989 was criticised for its Eurocentric perspective (notwithstanding its venerable intentions) to which the last three Asia Pacific Triennials have attempted to be some sort of corrective. Mounted by the Queensland Art Gallery in Brisbane, the exhibition's close proximity to Asia and the Pacific is very different to the perspective from Paris - a point emphasised by contemporary events in nearby East Timor. A great deal was also made of the event's inclusive curatorial structure (50 curators, 70 artists), yet APT3 was inevitably marked by the same hoary old divides - between East and West, North and South, developing and developed, pre- and post-industrial. This was most obvious in the 80 conference papers and 120 catalogue texts, which, despite the profusion of terms celebrating the 'interrelated', 'intersecting', 'border crossing', 'boundary-hopping' endeavour, rarely succeeded in crossing any brink at all, but repeatedly brought the audience to the same impasse: incommensurable terms and practices.
This is not to say that the event failed, but that a framework which attempts neat rhetorical resolution of conflict is inappropriate. After all, what is wrong with not crossing borders? What is it about the 'other side' that is so attractive, so alluring to curators and writers? To this end, the exhibition was at often at odds with what was stated, several works posing the problems far more effectively through a series of barely intelligible texts: rendering a confusing amalgam of different languages rather than proposing an effective, literate translation.
Xu Bing's New English Calligraphy (1994-99) comprised an invented script incorporating Latin characters within the formalism of Chinese calligraphy, the arrangement of letters determined by the rules of ideogrammatic representation. Xu Bing was commissioned to render the APT's title in this curious script for the banners outside the gallery, but he also constructed a classroom for audiences to learn how to read and write his new language, replete with desks, blackboard and videos. But even though we may attempt to learn the script in order to communicate with others, Xu Bing's calligraphy seems to engender a greater appreciation of the complexity of diverse languages rather than genuinely proposing some expedient synthesis (such as Esperanto).
In Walking on a Balance Beam (1999), South Korean artist Kim Young-Jin presented a room full of slide projectors illuminating the opposite wall with a grid of grimacing Korean faces enunciating each of the 54 phonemes of the Korean alphabet according to the movement of visitors through a field of sensors. The faces were painted white except for the mouths outlined in big red smiles. A ridiculous attempt at communication by a clownish interlocutor? The interaction generated a random, completely unintelligible language - a disquieting guttural form of expression which nonetheless revealed the complicated nature of communication.
In the multiple video projection Dialogue (1996-99), Japanese artist Shigeaki Iwai excerpted various recorded conversations between 80 people from 58 different countries. The participants were seated around tables in groups of four and performed a simple conversation (in their native language) scripted by the artist, but were unable to understand the questions and answers surrounding their own comments. The profusion of irreconcilable sounds and signs quickly proved the implicit complexity (in fact utter chaos) contained in the most simple communication.
Yet, take, for example, the letter 'M', spelt out in bright plastic yellow. It's a patented symbol, reproduced under strict license throughout the world, and it belongs to a fast-food chain. It's understood everywhere - the ultimate linguistic sign of global convergence and communication. Japanese artist Masato Nakamura reproduced and repeated this infamous motif in QSC + mV (Quality, Service, Clean + m Value) (1998-9), to nauseating effect, the golden arches placed end-on-end seeming to build a bridge extending forever, crossing borders in what could be viewed as a terrifying parody of the worst of new international rhetoric.
