“M+ Matters: Art and Design in the Digital Realm”

M+, Hong Kong’s new museum of visual culture, is pleased to announce “M+ Matters: Art and Design in the Digital Realm,” to be held at Tai Kwun Centre for Heritage and Arts on Friday, August 31 and Saturday, September 1, 2018. 

“Art and Design in the Digital Realm” is a two-night, one-day event that brings together artists, designers, creative technologists, and curators from across Asia, Europe, and North America. Consisting of a performance, a panel discussion, a series of artist talks, and a data design hackathon, “Art and Design in the Digital Realm” is M+’s most direct articulation of its commitment to fostering conversations and defining a perspective on digital visual culture today.

As a museum dedicated to contemporary visual art, design and architecture, and the moving image, M+ is deeply engaged with current digital practices, with a particular focus on experiments, innovations, and critical voices from Asia. “Art and Design in the Digital Realm” looks at the immense impact of digital technology on the aesthetics and sociopolitical concerns of contemporary art and design, as well as the place of art and artists within the rhizomatic space of the internet. It considers the way the digital has both transcended physical limits and accentuated differences between local cultural contexts.  

“Art and Design in the Digital Realm” opens on the evening of Friday, August 31 with the final public performance by Seoul-based artist duo YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES. Titled THE ARTIST TALK TO END ALL ARTIST TALKS — OR, THE STRUGGLE SESSION CONTINUES!, this brand-new work, co-presented by M+ and Tai Kwun Centre for Heritage and Arts, features the pair’s signature text-based computer animations synchronised to original music. This not-to-be-missed performance is followed by a discussion between Young-Hae Chang and Marc Voge of YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES; Tobias Berger, Head of Arts at Tai Kwun; and Ulanda Blair, Curator of Moving Image at M+.

THE ARTIST TALK TO END ALL ARTIST TALKS — OR, THE STRUGGLE SESSION CONTINUES! also celebrates M+’s pioneering acquisition of YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES: THE COMPLETE WORKS (YHCHANG.COM/AP2), a complete and growing archive of more than 500 works. This extraordinary collection, which will be updated twice each year for as long as the artists continue to make new work and present projects internationally, will be made available to future visitors to M+, on-site and on demand.   

Also on Friday, August 31, M+ launches the M+ Data Design Hackathon, inviting designers, artists, technologists, and others to activate the newly released open data on the M+ Collections, through special research and creative projects. The hackathon is led by Micah Walter, a New York–based creative technologist, and Jane Pong, a data visualisation designer based in Hong Kong, and continues through Saturday, September 1. 

“M+ Matters: Art and Design in the Digital Realm” also features a full day of artist talks on September 1, exploring how data collection, artificial intelligence, simulations, social media, and creative programming are all being leveraged by contemporary practitioners working online. Talks include “Chinternet Stockholm Syndrome” by artist Miao Ying (Shanghai/New York), “Making Digital Matter” by interactive design studio Moniker / Thomas Boland (Amsterdam), “Worlding” by artist Ian Cheng (New York), and “Poetic Computation and Non-binary Futures” by artist, educator, and activist Taeyoon Choi (New York/Seoul). The talks programme is facilitated by curator and writer Kerry Doran (Buenos Aires/New York).  

“Art and Design in the Digital Realm” is the 17th edition of M+ Matters, an ongoing series of public talks that seeks to unpack critical ideas that shape visual culture in Asia and beyond. The M+ Matters series informs M+’s future curatorial directions, in conversation with its audience.

“M+ Matters: Art and Design in the Digital Realm” is organised by Ulanda Blair (Curator, Moving Image, M+), Ikko Yokoyama (Curator, Design and Architecture, M+), Lara Day (Senior Manager, Digital and Cross-Platform Content, M+), and Diane Wang (Producer, Digital Programme, M+), with support from Janis Law (Assistant Curator, Moving Image, M+).

Event details
YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES PRESENTS
THE ARTIST TALK TO END ALL ARTIST TALKS —
OR, THE STRUGGLE SESSION CONTINUES!
August 31, 2018 (Friday), 7–9pm
For more information and to register, please click here.

M+ Matters: M+ Data Design Hackathon
August 31, 2018 (Friday), 7–10pm; September 1, 2018 (Saturday), 10am–5:30pm
For more information and to register, please click here.

“M+ Matters: Art and Design in the Digital Realm”
September 1, 2018 (Saturday), 10am–5:30pm
For more information and to register, please click here.

About M+
M+ is a museum dedicated to collecting, exhibiting, and interpreting visual art, design and architecture, moving image, and Hong Kong visual culture of the 20th and 21st centuries. In Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, we are building one of the largest museums of modern and contemporary visual culture in the world, with a bold ambition to establish ourselves as one of the world’s leading cultural institutions. Our aim is to create a new kind of museum that reflects our unique time and place, a museum that builds on Hong Kong’s historic balance of the local and the international to define a distinctive and innovative voice for Asia’s 21st century. 

About the West Kowloon Cultural District
Located on Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour, the West Kowloon Cultural District is one of the largest cultural projects in the world. Its vision is to create a vibrant new cultural quarter for Hong Kong. With a complex of theatres, performance spaces, and museums, the West Kowloon Cultural District will produce and host world-class exhibitions, performances, and cultural events, and will provide 23 hectares of public open space, including a two-kilometre waterfront promenade.