11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art
The Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art is still one of the most hotly anticipated exhibitions on the international calendar. VAULT looks at what this 11th iteration has to offer.
Image credit: Mit Jai, Inn Planes (Electric), 2019 oil on canvas dimensions variable Installation view, Encounters, Art Basel Hong Kong, 2019 © Mit Jai Inn Courtesy the artist and Silverlens, Manila and New York.
This summer, audiences will again be able to experience the transformation of Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) for the hotly anticipated 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art. Since 1993, the ambitious, ever-growing, continent-spanning project has invited visitors, over four million and counting, into conversation with the myriad regions that make up Asia and the Pacific, doing so through the ever-evolving and shape-shifting forms of contemporary art. It is a program that has reshaped the city’s cultural landscape and beyond. With this latest iteration, its ambitions continue unabated.
This 11th outing takes place in the wake of the global pandemic that loomed large over the region – and over the Triennial’s previous iteration. While echoes of it are present in small details (a discarded mask in the corner of a painting, say) and in ongoing concerns around surveillance and the state, also present are the urgent, ongoing concerns for ecology and the environment, on scales local to global. Aptly for a city shaped by its river and a gallery situated on its tamed banks, the exhibition is threaded through with images of and lessons about river systems.
This thread began close to home, in neighbouring Aotearoa, with the work of two collectives. AWA (Natalie Robertson, Graeme Atkins and Lionel Matenga) was formed in 2023 to elevate and amplify the voice of the Waiapu River, exhibiting work that examines the devastating impacts of farming and deforestation on the remote system. Meanwhile, Paemanu, a collective of contemporary Ngāi Tahu visual artists, has been working collaboratively with local traditional owners, sharing knowledge that links their Waitaki River to the Maiwar (Brisbane River). And so rivers flow throughout the exhibition, reappearing in works including Vietnam’s Lê Giang’s glowing series of ... Subscribe to read all articles in full
