POWER PLAYS

Opening: 09/09/2005, 6-8pm

Borrow a famous painting - Tattoo a 250 cm line on six paid people - Build a wall on the street - Guide sheep around a flagpole - Fight for your Panda - Make people demonstrate - Put a black square on the Red square - Run against the tram - Dance in Starbucks - Play with the CCTV - Ribbon up Tiananmen Square

In Hong Kong, the city of huge and creative demonstrations POWER PLAYS presents eleven of the most important political performance and video works of the last three decades. What do artists do when they need to act up? One possible action is to leave the safety of one's studio, go out and stage their statement, publicly in ways which others may consider slightly unusual.

These carefully orchestrated political and artistic statements are actions carried out in the same vein of Action art movements prominent in the 60s. One event that was emblematic of such movements is the famous Festival of New Art: ACTION / AGIT-OP / DECOLLAGE / HAPPENING / EVENTS / ANTI-ART / L'AUTRISME/ ART TOTAL / REFLUXUS held on 1964 in Aachen where German artist Joseph Beuys got beaten up yet continued performing for another four hours with a bloody nose. It is the combination between the urge to perform, a personal political mission, and conceptual depth that make this artistic practice so fascinating.

The videos featured in POWER PLAYS are documentations of artists carrying out their acts; some are spontaneous and risky, while others are staged as improvised happenings. Treading between the lines of humor and horror, the executed works form manifestations of the artists' political and artistic intent.

Francis Alys – Patriotic Stories, 1997 Denis Beaubois, In the Event of Amnesia the city will recall, 1996 Annelise Coste - Tram Performance, 1997/98 Irwin - Black Square on the red square, 1992 Lin Yilin - Safely manoeuvring across Lin He Road, 1995 Pak Sheung-chuen,- A Present to the Central Government: The Yellow Ribbons, 2005 Radek Community - Manifestation, 2001 Santiago Sierra - 250cm line tattooed on six paid people, 1999 The Kingpins - Welcome to the Jingle, 2003 Ulay - There is a Criminal Contact in Art , 1976 Zhao Bandi - A court case in Nov.11th.2003

Curated by Tobias Berger

POWER PLAYS
Artists Challenge Authorities
Kurator: Tobias Berger

mit Francis Alÿs, Denis Beaubois, Annelise Coste, Irwin , The Kingpins , Lin Yilin, Tiozer Pak Sheung-chuen, Radek Community , Santiago Sierra, Ulay , Zhao Bandi