Tuesday 15 March 2011

Tribute To Japan Street Art: Earthquake destroys Street Art Murals....

SimonBirchNewWork
I can’t comment on the entire local art scene, but for the hipster circle I can offer a few insights. Recently people have been migrating to Chai Wan – a neighborhood at the far Eastern point of Hong Kong Island. In particular the building called Chai Wan Industrial City, is getting hotter. Home to several popular photography studios, the former warehouse is drawing more devotees due to its large spaces and cheap rents (a near impossible to find combination in Hong Kong!) Two new arrivals in particular have been bringing a new audience and vibe to the area.
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 street artists to showcase their work.
An Art-Wall at Rockit
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Before the Nike shop event, I headed out to the far east side of Hong Kong Island to a neighborhood called Chai Wan to attend the opening exhibition of a new gallery. The gallery is actually an extension of the Chancery Lane Gallery in Central’s Soho neighborhood. The new location is a massive warehouse / old factory building that has been subdivided.
Looks like
When I got out of the elevator, I saw the familiar street art of Simon Birch, who was curating the opening show. Taking a right, I entered into a room with a mini half-pipe, with skaters in full session. On the side of the ramp were several hanging canvases. I had to warn a few of the gallery-goers to stay clear of the side of the ramp, just in case any runaway boards came shooting out – a lesson I learned the hard way about a decade ago! Ouch!
Grinding the lip of the ramp
About to drop in...
Next I walked over to the main gallery space which was packed with a diverse lot of art enthusiasts, enthusiastically consuming free drinks. The hallway leading into the main gallery featured stencils of superheroes flying through the air.
It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s, it’s ???
Although the gallery offered a larger space than most in Central, the big turnout made it seem small. Click the image below for a bigger version.
Click to see a bigger version...
Along one wall were a bank of photos by Wing Shya.
Photos by Wing Shya lined one of the walls
Simon Birch also had two paintings on the same side.
A painting by artist / curator Simon Birch
Suspended from the ceiling were two large guns, each crafted using interesting materials.
Guns pointing at each other
A close-up of one of the guns
The other featured artists included Cang Xin, Huang Rui, Anthony Lam, Li Wei, Tatsuyuki Tanaka (a famous anime artist,) and Stanley Wong.
Chancery Lane Gallery Annex address:
Chai Wan Industrial City, Phase 1, Unit 614
60 Wing Tai Road, Chai Wan
Hong Kong
July 6th, 2006
A view of the upstairs part of the gallery
IdN put on an exhibition with the street art collective – ST/ART – featuring 450 individual 12″ by 12″ canvases. The significance of 450 square feet is that the Hong Kong government classifies the average apartment at 450 square feet. The exhibition aims to show that each foot can be made into something special.
Some of the images below can be clicked to reveal larger, more detailed photos.
Other side of the upstairs gallery space
An installation from the ST/ART collective.
Sign-in board tagged by artists at the front of the exhibition
A complex series of canvases strung together.
My favorite piece - a building done in a more classical style
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July 5th, 2006
After checking out the show at Kapok I headed over to the IdN Gallery space in Wanchai. IdN (International designers Network) is a famous digital design magazine based in Hong Kong. They’re located on a small street where cars cannot drive down. The narrow street is filled on either side with hawker stalls, and the IdN building is somewhat hidden.
On this night, it would be easy to spot, as arty-looking people were spilled out onto the street outside the space. I didn’t know anything about the exhibition, but it was a book release party for designer Stephen Lau, who had published a book titled ‘Fusion’ through IdN with 50 contributors.
I had arrived late, and just missed the live painting below:
Painting done that night...
The artwork on the walls was mostly Stephen Lau’s illustrations on the second floor, and works from contributors occupied the ground floor.
These guys look a little like Beavis and Butthead to me!
Cool throne illustration on 6 panels.
Ground floor, after party was over!
Downstairs wall covered in posters for the book launch.

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