Regarding the work Re:Looking (2002) –
a video work that went through several stages till it was concluded as a
re-edited video surrounded by a fictional living room, a meticulously created
environment – Wong Hoy Cheong was asked why he chose Austria to put it in scene
as a colony of an Islamic Malaysian State. The main reasons are for the
historical role it had as a colonial power in eastern Europe during the 19th
century, the little that is known about this small country today and the site
specific expectations the organizers had.[1] By
referring to the past and the Austro Hungarian-Ottoman wars the spot is put
again on the Christian-Muslim conflict:
“Malaysia is a Muslim country.
Historically speaking, Austria had a very tense
relationship to Muslims. The Ottoman Empire failed twice at seizing
Vienna. So what better phobia to provoke and undermine
– as a "colonialist" – than to propose that Austria was colonized by
Muslims over 200 years ago? Colonialism and even modern-day imperialism work in
similar ways – so it doesn’t matter whether it was Britain, America, Austria, Japan, or somewhere else.”
The ways colonial and
modern-day imperialism work should drawn attention to. But regarding the site
specific aspect and the way it was presented after the screening the video at
the Schauspielhaus in Vienna Wong Hoy Cheong adds:
“After being shown at the
Schauspielhaus in Vienna as a screen projection, the first cut of
"Re:Looking" was then shown again at the art museum Kunsthalle Wien
on a television set placed on a pedestal. I didn’t feel at ease with the way it
was presented. For me it was a documentary, a news broadcast that one watches
at home in a living room space.”
This whole environment
was created and the video placed in it. The docufiction or mockumentary was
surrounded by selected and created everyday life objects that often unknowingly
are charged with colonial history and created this environment. This
environment required also changes to be done to the video and other media where
considered.[2] While
the format of the video, first improperly exhibited as some kind of video-sculpture,
it later becomes part of an environment that somehow also reminds of an
ethnographic showcase.
From the series Days of Our Lives Wong
Hoy Cheong dedicates at least two photo-graphies to the conflict between the
Christian and the Muslim Weltanschauung and the “phobias” expressed
towards Muslims. The focus is placed on certain groups that were given special
attention by European media and in public discussions: The young male urban
youth and women. The first are portraited in showing their contemporary
exclusion by adding to the picture historical and ahistorical modern suburban
buildings outside the town wall in the background. Certain iconologic elements
are replaced in order to identify the character's religion.
Wong Hoy Cheong[3] deals with themes of Colonial History and
Post-Colonial Studies, he has read Fanon's and Cesaire's[4] writings
intensively. Beside Fanon, also Paulo Freire and Augusto Boal[5] have
served also as basis to Wong's writings on decolonisation and 'Third
World' aesthetics.[6]
[1] "Marco Polo
Wunderwelt" exhibition at the Schauspielhaus in Vienna, 14.01.-23.02.2003 http://archiv.schauspielhaus.at/spielplan/detail.php?sel=19 accessed February 29, 2012 .
[2] Wong
states: “In terms of the video, the first cut was very different from what was
shown in Venice (and later shown again in Austria, then in Germany, France, Switzerland, Denmark, and now in Kuala Lumpur). The first cut was less
"news-like". It had longer takes and edits. I wanted a faster pace, a
far more "newsy" feeling. So I re-shot many of the scenes in Austria and Malaysia, and probably the most crucial
retake was of Arifwaran Shaharuddin (who co-directed many sequences) as the
news reporter in a blue screen studio. That made the documentary more believable.” http://universes-in-universe.org/eng/nafas/articles/2004/wong_hoy_cheong
- 28-02-2012
[3] Wong,
e-mail to author His Senior Hons. Thesis from 1981 Unmasking the myth of
science: critique of positivism as 'methodology' and 'ideology' at Brandeis University could not be consulted as well as
later texts on decolonisation of the post-colonial mind.
[4] Aimé
Fernand David Césaire (*1913- †2008), politician and writer from Martinique. Very close to Fanon and the
concept of 'Negritude'.
[5] Paulo
Freire, dramaturge known for Theatre of the Opressed (1973) and Augusto
Boal, writer and pedagogue known for Pedagogy
of the Oppressed (1968), both Brazilian and socialist.
[6] A. Maerkle,
“Complicit Consciousness” in ART “As I grow older I
have begun to see the connections between literature, critical theory, pedagogy
and visual arts much more clearly. In much of my work I do refer to my interest
in the history of ideas and pedagogy. My academic background has actually been
very useful. It took me a while to figure it out but it gave me a broader and
deeper notion of art making.
When I discuss art I often interrogate the complexities and complicities involved. For example, in the early 1990s I taught a course on third-world aesthetics that was very much influenced by the ideas of Freire as well as Augusto Boal's ideas on theatre as a political action of the oppressed.”
When I discuss art I often interrogate the complexities and complicities involved. For example, in the early 1990s I taught a course on third-world aesthetics that was very much influenced by the ideas of Freire as well as Augusto Boal's ideas on theatre as a political action of the oppressed.”
