M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story, the second exhibition of the M+ Sigg Collection, opens to public on 22 September 2023

M+, Asia’s first global museum of contemporary visual culture in the West Kowloon Cultural District in Hong Kong, is pleased to announce that M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story, the second exhibition of the M+ Sigg Collection, will open to the public from Friday, 22 September 2023 in the Sigg Galleries. Following the well-received inaugural exhibition M+ Sigg Collection: From Revolution to Globalisation, the new exhibition offers a different perspective on contemporary Chinese art through the lens of artists asserting their own presence and foregrounding a unique visual language.

M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story takes a visual approach to examine the styles and practices of contemporary Chinese art from the 1990s to the present. The transformation of Chinese society into a consumerist one during the 1990s exposed artists to the global stage and inspired them to re-establish their cultural identity as they revisited the visual legacies of socialist experience and Chinese tradition during China’s rapid development. The exhibition will feature over 120 works and is divided into four sections: ‘Facing Uncertainty’, ‘Sensory Overload’, ‘Ambivalent States’, and ‘Hidden Disruption’.

‘Facing Uncertainty’ presents artistic practices that focus on moments of fading and disappearance. As material life improved from the 1990s onwards, artists often expressed their doubts in the face of changing culture, history, and tradition.

‘Sensory Overload’ captures artists grappling with an overabundance of images and visual stimuli. With the proliferation of inexpensive, mass-produced goods and marketing imagery, artists in China increasingly turned their attention to commerce and technology.

‘Ambivalent States’ shows how artists embraced ambiguity and play with shifting meaning and values in society. Starting from the 1990s and 2000s, they strived towards creative free will and were interested in life’s ambiguities, making works that were familiar and yet absurd to expand the possibilities and interpretations of art.

‘Hidden Disruption’ demonstrates a widespread sense of ennui as artists in China used subtle interruptions as forms of commentary. They sought to articulate a sense of quietude and inner peace amid rapid changes in their environment. Beneath the tranquil surface, however, lies an undercurrent of energy and emotion deeply felt.

M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story is co-curated by Dr Uli Sigg, Dr Pi Li (former Sigg Senior Curator and Head of Curatorial Affairs, M+), Isabella Tam (Curator, Visual Art, M+), and Dr Wu Mo (Sigg Curator, M+).

Suhanya Raffel, Museum Director, M+, expresses her excitement for the upcoming M+ Sigg Collection presentation: ‘M+ is immensely proud of its world-class collection of twentieth-and twenty-first-century visual culture, including the signature M+ Sigg Collection, as a permanent collection deeply rooted in Asia yet defined, and developed, through a global perspective. This new exhibition, which follows the well-received M+ Sigg Collection: From Revolution to Globalisation, shows a unique perspective on how Chinese artists inventively navigated a rapidly changing era. We hope to provide a new lens for the public to explore and appreciate Chinese contemporary art from the 1990s to the present.’

Doryun Chong, Deputy Director, Curatorial and Chief Curator, M+, highlights how the exhibition captures a significant turning point in the trajectory of contemporary Chinese art: ‘China’s rapid transformation into a more open and international society during the 1990s offered Chinese artists unprecedented opportunity to experiment with contemporary artistic ideas and trends while grappling with the challenges and uncertainties associated with the times they were living in. M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story offers a thoughtful reading of the wholesale social and cultural transformation reflected in contemporary Chinese art, highlighting the multifaceted and intertwined relationships between art, individuals, and history.’

The M+ Sigg Collection is one of the largest and most comprehensive collections of contemporary Chinese art in the world. It chronicles the development of Chinese art over four decades, from 1972 to 2012. The collection’s unrivalled holdings of over 1,500 works that encompass a broad range of styles and mediums, including painting, printmaking, sculpture, performance, photography, and digital art. To show visitors more of the M+ Sigg Collection, there will be a selection of works displayed in West Gallery Annex, in parallel with M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story.

Public programmes for M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story

M+ will present a series of public programmes in relation to M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story throughout the exhibition period, including guided tours, in-gallery activities, workshops, dialogues, and short courses. There will also be school, community, and access tours and workshops to engage audiences from different backgrounds and needs. More details will be announced on the M+ website.

M+ will also host a conversation between artists Sun Yuan and Peng Yu, moderated by Ariadne Long, Assistant Curator, Visual Art, M+ at The Forum on Saturday, 14 October 2023. Known for creating large-scale installations and sculptures, the duo will share insights about their work Old People’s Home (2007) on display in the Sigg Galleries. The public talk will include discussions on how they conceptualise art, machinery, and technology in their artistic practice as well as the idea of struggle as a mode of collaboration. For more details of the talk, please refer to M+ website.

Ticketing arrangement for M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story

Visitors can access M+ Sigg Collection: Another Story with General Admission tickets starting from 22 September 2023. Standard General Admission tickets for visits until 30 September 2023 are sold at the Summer Special Discount price of HKD 90, while concessions tickets for General Admission* are priced at HKD 45. Standard General Admission tickets on or after 1 October 2023 will be sold at the original price of HKD 120 while concessions tickets* will be sold at HKD 60. Tickets to the exhibition are available for online purchase via the M+ website, West Kowoon Cultural District website, West Kowloon Cultural District App, Cityline, China Travel Service (Hong Kong) Limited, Fliggy, Klook, KKday, and Trip.com. M+ members and patrons can enjoy unlimited General Admission access. For more information on M+ ticket arrangements, please visit M+ website.

*Concessions tickets are available for full-time students, children ages 7 to 11, senior citizens ages 60 or above, person with disabilities and one companion, and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance (CSSA) recipients.

Remarks

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 twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, it is 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. M+ is 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 twenty-first century.

About the West Kowloon Cultural District
The West Kowloon Cultural District is one of the largest and most ambitious cultural projects in the world. Its vision is to create a vibrant new cultural quarter for Hong Kong on forty hectares of reclaimed land located alongside Victoria Harbour. With a varied mix of theatres, performance spaces, and museums, the West Kowloon Cultural District will produce and host world-class exhibitions, performances, and cultural events, providing twenty-three hectares of public open space, including a two-kilometre waterfront promenade.