“Ifs, Ands, or Buts” is the first exhibition presented by Rockbund Art Museum (RAM) in 2016 and the first museum solo exhibition in mainland China for Singaporean artist Heman Chong. The exhibition investigates spaces between text and images, producing new ways of relating the two through 7 new works commissioned specifically by Rockbund Art Museum.

Heman Chong often draws references from a multitude of things that we do not usually classify within the same group. He is able to place modernist literature such as Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett, alongside something as banal as Mr. Bean and The Road Runner, and even the gossip newspaper Apple Daily as if they belong together . “Ifs, Ands, or Buts” can be interpreted as a fiction which may never be put into words. A fiction that is absurd and bizarre, one that is equipped with a sardonic, black humor, where different situations find themselves misplaced in the realm between reality and fantasy.

The exhibition begins with a site specific installation entitled Legal Bookshop (Shanghai). It involves the displacement of the gift shop with a bookshop. For this work, Chong hired Ken Liu, a lawyer who is also an award-winning author and translator of speculative fiction via email. Chong wrote, as an invitation:

“I would like you to select books that touches on the idea of the law; including both fiction and non-fiction books. They can be textbooks that law students use for their studies, books that lawyers use for reference, copies of the legal acts in China, novels where characters get entangled with the law, books that touch on the history of the law, maybe even books on scientific laws. I want you to interpret the idea of ‘the law’ when you think about this list.” The choice of books is solely Liu’s. Chong’s involvement is merely to invite him to participate by selecting the books, all of which will be available for sale at this temporary bookshop.

The duo channel video installation Re-Re-Re-Run screens every single episode from Rowan Atkinson’s Mr. Bean and Road Runner animations, played repeatedly for the entire duration of the exhibition on a large outdoor LED screen with the sound from both channels amplified to an unbearable level. The Mysterious Island is a sad and unfulfilling recreation of the elusive and utopian Peach Blossom Island, using plastic peach blossom trees in full bloom ordered on taobao.com, set against a background of walls painted blue, a blue often used in film production as blue screens. A large-scale light box installation titled One Thousand And One Nights, which will be installed on the north fa?ade of the museum, highlighting the differences in meaning of the title of the classic collection of stories in Arabic, Chinese, and English. Papaya Daily, a work that functions both as a short story and an installation, the name of which is also an anthology of gossip Chong has heard of or read about since 2003. Endless (Nights) , is a monumental sculpture made up of ten thousand copies of unprinted, blank newspapers sit quietly in a darkened room. Finally, the performance, Everything will witness a series of readers sliding over the content of Baidu Baike, the Chinese online encyclopedia, as an unrealized, unfinished fiction.

About the artist

Heman Chong (b. 1977, Muar) is an artist and writer whose work is located at the intersection between image, performance, situations and writing. His work continuously interrogates the many functions of the production of narratives in our everyday lives. Heman Chong has presented a number of solo exhibitions at South London Gallery (London, 2015), Art Sonje Center (Seoul, 2015), P! (New York, 2014), The Reading Room (Bangkok, 2013), NUS Museum (Singapore, 2012), Vitamin Creative Space (Guangzhou, 2007), Art in General (New York, 2007), Project Arts Centre (Dublin, 2006), etc.

He has also participated in numerous international biennales including 20th Sydney Biennale (Upcoming, 2016), 10th Gwangju Biennale (2014), Asia Pacific Triennale 7 (2012), Performa 11 (2011), Momentum 6 (2011), Manifesta 8 (2010), 2nd Singapore Biennale (2008), SCAPE Christchurch Biennale (2006), Busan Biennale (2004), 10th India Triennale (2000) and he represented Singapore in the 50th Venice Biennale (2003).

Chong’s work has also been part of a number of group exhibitions at internationally recognised institutions including Tate Modern, New Museum, Monnaie de Paris, Museum fur Gewerbe und Kunst Hamburg, The National Museum of Art Osaka, Hessel Museum, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Sharjah Art Foundation, Taipei Contemporary Art Center, San Francisco Asian Art Museum, Kumho Museum of Art, Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, Kroeller-Muller Museum, Stedelijk Museum Bureau, Nam June Paik Art Center, Gertrude Contemporary, Arnolfini, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami, Hamburger Bahnhof, Fukuoka Asian Art Museum, Kadist Art Foundation, Daejeon Museum of Art.

About the curator

Li Qi is Senior Curator at Rockbund Art Museum (RAM), Shanghai. He was Opinions Editor at The Art Newspaper China and Senior Editor at LEAP, where he currently serves as a contributing editor. At RAM, he organized the 2015 Hugo Boss Asia Art Award for Emerging Asian Artists. In 2014, Li Qi curated “CONDITIONS: An Exhibition of Queer Art,” at club Destination, Beijing. He is the producer of documentary film Chen Zhen (2015), and editor of Chen Zhen: Without going to New York and Paris, life could be internationalized (2015). Li Qi graduated from Beijing’s Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA), and from London’s Chelsea College of Art and Design. He has worked at institutions such as the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in Beijing and the British Film Institute (BFI) in London.

About Ken Liu, Collaborator of Legal Bookshop (Shanghai)

Ken Liu is an author and translator of speculative fiction, as well as a lawyer and programmer. A winner of the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy Awards, he has been published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Asimov’s, Analog, Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, and Strange Horizons, among other places. He also translated the Hugo-winning novel, The Three-Body Problem, by Liu Cixin, which is the first translated novel to win that award.

Ken’s debut novel, The Grace of Kings, the first in a silkpunk epic fantasy series, was published by Saga Press in April 2015. Saga will also publish a collection of his short stories, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, in March 2016.

After receiving his J.D. degree from Harvard Law School, Ken clerked for the Honorable Sandra L. Lynch on the United States First Circuit Court of Appeals. Thereafter, he joined a major corporate law firm in Boston, specializing in tax and real estate matters. Currently, he works as a litigation consultant for intellectual property cases, combining his skills as a lawyer and as a programmer. He lives with his family near Boston, Massachusetts.

About RAM

For 5 years RAM has been at the fore-front of the growing contemporary art scene in China, presenting world-class programmes in a unique museum setting. A boutique Museum of the upmost quality, RAM holds a unique position within Shanghai’s continually expanding cultural scene. The Museum is located within the Bund district and housed in an exquisite heritage Art Deco building which was renovated by architect David Chipperfield before opening in 2010.

The museum’s exemplary curatorial, education and research programmes showcase acclaimed and emerging Chinese and international artists, responding to and reflecting on present and urgent challenges of society locally and internationally. RAM presents a bold and pioneering programme of 3 exhibitions per year; exploring and realising artists’ most ambitious projects and working with them to tailor exhibitions to the Museum and to the Shanghai context, often with a large proportion of works being new commissions. RAM devises, produces and curates its programme in-house, in conjunction with carefully selected international collaborations of the highest quality.

About the exhibition

Date: Jan 23, 2016 - May 3, 2016

Venue: Rockbund Art Museum

Address: 20 Huqiu Road, Huang Pu District, Shanghai

Courtesy of the artist and Rockbund Art Museum, for further information please visit www.rockbundartmuseum.org.