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War-mart
Andrew Chan's solo exhibition featuring
3-D, video,
paintings and drawings
War-mart, the latest show by Australian artist Andrew Chan -- opening November 14 at New York’s hpgrp gallery -- couldn't be more timely given this heated presidential election season. It ponders the ravages of war, its aftermath and its cultural impact.
This new exhibition at hpgrp gallery New York in Manhattan's Meatpacking District features an 11-foot-long papier-mâché battleship ... drawings and paintings depicting disturbing piles of military and other industrial detritus (helmets, scrap metal, engine blocks and Humvees) ... a "Terrorvision" wall of portraits in the style of TV-screen media walls, featuring terrorists and extremists in the media ... and a video in collaboration with New York-based artist Jason Varone representing a glitchy, questionable security camera on the battleship.
Andrew Chan’s work has been described as "apocalyptic realism” by Ben Binstock, the author of Vermeer’s Family Secrets (Routledge, 2008) and a professor of art history at Cooper Union. Andrew’s work ranges from commentaries on rampant consumerism, the underlying violence and abyss of Western culture, even our obsession with food, consumption (in all forms) and eating. In "War-mart," these themes are weaved around the central form of a 11-foot-long battleship, paintings and drawings of military and industrial detritus, a surveillance video and a wall of works featuring competing images taken from television.
The papier-mâché battleship, "Chan o' War," riffs on an object that is obsolete. The dilapidated form of this mammoth hulk of a battleship represents an American foreign policy in the service of ambivalent, frustrated and fraught domestic political agendas. The mammoth, ghost-like battleship seems to fail or in danger of buckling before the viewers eye as if being crushed by the weight of the viewer's expectations of what a battleship looks like and should be -- a work of precision engineering.
In the surveillance video that accompanies the battleship sculpture (a collaboration with multimedia artist, Jason Varone) black and white grainy footage of the four-quadrant surveillance video takes the viewer inside the battleship from the vantage point of a security camera that flickers in a loop -- a nether fantasy world where real experience is substituted for a voyeuristic, vicarious one.
Andrew’s paintings continue the theme. "Stockpile to Target" features the disturbing piles of military and industrial detritus adds up to a condemnation of the overwhelming waste of our consumerist / capitalist / American culture. The stacks of Humvees are regurgitated as a fleshy mass of parts. In "Terror-vision," a work composed of 40 separate paintings that form a wall of screaming screens from which Bulgarian Idol, cosmetic surgery, seeming terrorists, talking heads, military analysts and denizens of the 24 hour news entertainment cycle.
About the Artist:
Moving from Australia to Hong Kong in 1993, Andrew Chan became a regular fixture in the contemporary art scene with solo and group shows and press attention including features in the Asian Wall Street Journal, TIME Asia, Asian Art News and on CNN International’s Inside Asia. He has also exhibited in New York, Australia and London. He received the Richard L. Saffert award for painting from the National Arts Club in New York, the Jack Goodman Award for Art and Technology and a grant from the Pollock Krasner Foundation. Andrew received an MA in Art from New York University and a BA in Architecture from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia. Based in New York since 1999, where he lives with his wife and daughter, Andrew divides his time between Australia, Asia and the U.S. For more information, visit www.AndrewChanArt.com.
Andrew Chan's Bio
Andrew Chan moved to Hong Kong in 1993 where he became a regular fixture in group and solo exhibitions in contemporary art spaces such as Gallerie Martini, Trigram and Regal galleries. He has also exhibited in New York, Australia and London. His work has been reviewed in The New York Times, The Asian Wall Street Journal, Asian Art News and on CNN's Inside Asia. In 2000 he received the Richard L. Saffert award for painting from the National Arts Club in New York. Andrew received an MA in Art from New York University, where he received the Jack Goodman Award for Art and Technology. In 2002 he was awarded the prestigious Pollock Krasner Foundation grant, in addition to a grant from the New York Foundation for the Arts. Andrew was invited to speak on food and art at the 2001 College Arts Association conference in Chicago where he presented an original video and a paper on TV cooking shows as pornography that was subsequently published in the Nov. 2003 issue of Gastronomica. In 2004, Andrew was invited to present his food-related art and speak at the international Gourmet Voice festival on food and culture, which was held in Cannes, France. Based in New York since 1999, where he lives with his wife and daughter, Andrew divides his time between Australia, Asia and the U.S.
Exhibitions—Solo
2009 “Typhoon Shelter Blues” – Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong (Spring ‘09)
2008 “War-mart” – HPGRP Gallery, New York
2004 “Killing Me Softee” - Jackman Gallery, Melbourne, Australia
2002 “White Room” - White Columns, New York
2000 “A Fish, A Tram and A Chan” - Galerie Regal, Hong Kong
1999 “Ghost in the Tram” - FAD Gallery, Melbourne
1998 “La Belle et la Bete” – Galerie Martini, Hong Kong
1997 “The Handover show” - Galerie Martini, Hong Kong
1997 “Un Cafe Creme” - Continental Gallery, Melbourne
Exhibitions—Group
2008 “Sweet Dreams”, HPGRP Gallery New York, NY
2008 “Watch Dog Charity Jubilee 2008,” 10 Chancery Lane, Hong Kong
2007 “Loaded,” M.Y Art Prospects, New York, NY
2006 “New York Narrative,” Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan
2006 “Summer Group Show,” 3rd Ward, Brooklyn, NY
2006 “Fresh Start,” Santa Monica, CA
2006 “No Money Down,” Gallery Aferro, Newark, NJ
2005 “A Changed Perspective,” Visual Arts Center, Hong Kong
2005 Philosophers Box, New York City
2005 “Watch Dog 2005,” Hong Kong
2004 “Sub-Plot,” Barthelemy Gallery, New York
2004 “Windows,” Kimmel Center, New York University
2003 “Watch Dog 2003,” Hong Kong
2001 “Watch Dog 2001,” Hong Kong
2001 “International Works on Paper,” Soho20, New York
2001 “Summer Spices,” Galerie Martini, Hong Kong
2001 NYU M.A. Art Thesis Show, 80 Washington Square Gallery, New York
2001 “In the Pink,” Rosenberg Gallery, New York
2001 “Video Marathon,” Art in General Gallery, New York
2000 “National Arts Club Show, represented NYU
1999 “Tri-Cityscape,” Trigram Gallery, Hong Kong
1998 “Visions from Hong Kong,” Trigram Gallery, Hong Kong/London
1998 “Stars Alight,” Galerie Martini, Hong Kong
Awards & Grants
2002 New York Foundation for the Arts
2002 Pollock Krasner Foundation
2001 Jack Goodman, New York University
2001 National Arts Club, New York
Other Highlights
2004 “Gourmet Voice” International Food & Arts Conference (Cannes, France)
Panelist; paper entitled: “Representations of Food and Cooking”
2001 Added to slide files at the Drawing Center and White Columns, New York
2001 Featured speaker at College Arts Association annual conference (Chicago)
1993+ Artwork reprinted in TIME Magazine (Asia), Wall Street Journal and other publications
Education
2001 MA Studio Art, New York University, New York
1993 BA Architecture, RMIT, Melbourne, Australia
Bibliography—Reviews
2008 “Charity Jubilee”, Prestige Magazine (HK)
2006 “New York Narratives”, The Oakland Post, IL
2006 “Unambiguous,” Art World Digest
2005 “A Changed Perspective,” South China Morning Post
2003 “Biting the Hand That Feeds Them,” The New York Times
2001 Profiled on CNN International’s weekly series, Inside Asia
1999 “Painting Inside the Chicken Coop,” The Asian Wall Street Journal
1999 “Life in Hong Kong‑But Not as We Know It,” South China Morning Post (HK)
1999 “A Fish, A Tram and A Chan,” The Hong Kong Tatler
1999 “A Fish, A Tram and A Chan,” HK Magazine
1999 “Opening up a world behind closed doors,” South China Morning Post
1998 “Captured in a Café,” The Herald Sun, Melbourne, Australia
1998 “Beastly Women,” South China Morning Post
1998 “La Belle et la Bete,” The Hong Kong Tatler
1998 “Artist’s Brush with Cracks in Hong Kong Society,” Hong Kong Standard
1997 “The Shifting Ground,” Asian Art News
1997 “Tete a Tete with Andrew Chan,” Home Journal Asia
1997 “A Casual Appreciation of Art,” The Age, Melbourne
Bibliography—Published Articles
2003 Wrote article for Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture
(University of California Press), Fall 2003 issue. Article entitled,
“La Grande Bouffe: Cooking Shows as Pornography.”
1998 Wrote article for The Asian Wall Street Journal,
“Down and Out in Post-Handover Hong Kong.”