Hot Concrete: Los Angeles Comes To Hong Kong For A Groundbreaking Exhibition

K11 MUSEA presents Hot Concrete: LA to HK, the first major group presentation of Los Angeles-based artists in Hong Kong, running from Friday, 21 October through to Sunday, 13 November 2022. Sponsored and supported by UBS AG, H.Moser & Cie and Ruinart; the exhibition is curated by Sow & Tailor (Los Angeles), presented by K11 MUSEA (Hong Kong) and WOAW Gallery (Hong Kong); and co-organized by Ouyang Art Consulting (Los Angeles). Hot Concrete: LA to HK is the second iteration of Sow & Tailor’s inaugural exhibition from 2021 with an expanded selection of thirty artists and over fifty-five artworks. As an epicenter for creativity not only in Asia, but also internationally, Hong Kong enthusiastically welcomes the explosive creativity of Los Angeles and the breadth and rigor of its multidisciplinary and multi generational artists. Hot Concrete: LA to HK’s unique curatorial perspective uses the four major principles of ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangement, as its point of departure, particularly a fresh approach, movement, balance, and harmony. The exhibition is not only a bridge that connects two significant artistic hubs and geographies, but also provides Hong Kong’s art-viewing public with a glimpse into the current creative energy of Los Angeles and its limitless opportunities for exploration, innovation, and self-fashioning. Hot Concrete not only fosters cultural exchange, but also injects the vibrancy of Los Angeles into Hong Kong’s cultural landscape, benefiting the latter’s community of artists, curators, collectors, and enthusiasts of art.

All images Courtesy of Sow & Tailor, Los Angeles and WOAW Gallery, Hong Kong. Photography and video by Hannah Kirby / Time Based Media 911, Los Angeles.

Lust, Aliens and Summer Nights: Aryo Toh Djojo's Crepuscular World Stuns and Frightens

Aryo Toh Djojo’s world is a crepuscular world where the distant buzz of alien spacecraft whirs like a high voltage transformer, arcing between coils with the secret blue language of electricity. This is also the language of Djojo’s paintings, which were recently on view at Sow & Tailor in Los Angeles. They are hard to pin down, they are elusive and evocative, which makes them hit that spot between nostalgia and eroticism. This is your brain on UFOs, weed, and the hot magnesium flash of lust. Inside the hinterlands of Djojo’s hyper-realistic airbrushed canvases, there is the feeling of eternal summer, but also alien abduction, which could be seen as a metaphor for the amnesia of youth—for the forgetting of yesterday to live for today.

Greg Ito's "Hallowed Ground" @ ArtCubed LA

Margaret Wise Brown’s iconic children’s book, Goodnight Moon, was published at a time when research on child’s psychology was germinating. The story was instrumental because it strayed from the fairytales and legends typically reserved for children and focused instead on what was directly familiar to them, i.e. what items lay about in their room. Familiarity manifests itself in Greg Ito’s penchant for giant neon-lit candelabras and paintings of mythological imagery juxtaposed with local geography, many of which are bordered by window sills echoing the illustrations from Brown’s book.

In conjunction with Ito’s installation is a dining experience from chef Richard Blais, who’s tailored his dishes to Ito’s works in order to complement and correspond playfully (some plates include “Bird in Hand” and “Unicorn Soup”) rather than mimic abjectly. Hallowed Ground follows a lineage of art and dinner-related installations; Judy Chicago’s The Dinner Party and more recently, Monkey Town, come to mind.

Pop-ups have become standard fare as fleeting outlets for creative synthesis; Blais himself could be recognized for his appearance on ‘Top Chef’. But with familiarity also lurks the unrevealed or obscured. “Everything is not what it seems”, muses Blais. The exhibition’s name reinforces the exhibition’s church-like layout, and Ito’s paintings adorn the walls like stained-glass windows. However, while the candelabras induce a divine glow, they also emulate a sordid motel’s vacancy sign or even the hues of a red-light district.

The marriage of Ito’s multidisciplinary installation and Blais’ culinary accompaniment creates a spectacle. Considering the show is also housed in a former Hollywood soundstage, Hallowed Ground alludes to the Entertainment Capital of the World’s capacity to seduce the city’s art world.

Hallowed Ground runs from May 11th - June 3rd, 2018 at ArtCubed LA (1541 N. Cahuenga Blvd., Los Angeles, CA, 90028).

Liam Casey is a freelance writer, researcher and DJ from Los Angeles. In addition to being a contributor for Berlin Art Link, he also has a background in housing and urban planning, co-developing a think-tank on Los Angeles’ housing crisis. He is also a co-organizer and resident of the queer collective Bubbles.

The Opening Of Mario Ayala & Greg Ito's "Sun Sprawl" @ Club Pro Los Angeles

These stanzas of Wanda Coleman’s reach across time to help locate the work of Los Angeles-based artists Mario Ayala and Greg Ito. Following in the tradition of the city’s unofficial poet laureate, Ayala and Ito explore the ecology of symbols distinct to their birthplace, elevating and reconfiguring the ubiquitous visual language and objects central to the experience and mythology of Los Angeles. Sun Sprawl is on view through April 28th at Club Pro 1525 South Main Street, 3rd Floor Los Angeles. photographs by Lani Trock

 

Highlights From Sun Kissed Chokehold Curated By Laura Watters & Kaylie Schiff

Sun Kissed Chokehold was a pop up group show on view in Highland Park on October 17, 2018. Featured artists include: Aaron Elvis Jupin, Adam Beris, Alina Perkins, Ariana Papademetropoulos, Bennet Shliesinger, Brendan Donnelly, Chris Fallon, Chris Lux, David Black, Giovanni Duca, Greg ito, Gustaf von Arbin, Hannah Hooper, Ivan Comas, Jessica Williams, John Zane Zappas, Lukas Geronimus, Mattea Perrotta, Maxwell McMaster, Nick Darmstaedter, Nicklas Stewart, Sam Keller, Steve Aldahl, and Sophia Green. photographs by Oliver Maxwell Kupper