Author: silasfong

  • The Eyes of Truth Don’t Look at the Broken Mirror

    Seoung Won Sun, Art Critic

    2021

    There should be nothing more reckless than an attempt to read the context of a creator through a work. The value of art is not born from the material but is generated when the material is transferred to a substitute. For example, the value of art is beyond the realistic interpretation of the shape and the color that the paint produces on the canvas. Instead, it means perceiving an esthetic value of the harmony made from the difference of the shape and the color, and creating its reflection on new things in each period of the history.

    There is no principle or method of putting the object of art and the value judgment in one line, but the act, intention and interpretative context that a piece of art can have through the process of its creation and circulation let us discover new value again. That is the ‘endless spiral structure of value’ and the virtuous circulation of the art, which is circulated beyond the material value of the art.1)

    The linguistic elements that Fong proposes as context are revealed through the visual form. The series work (SAD hereinafter) of Silas Fong started from his exhibition 《SAD Info Days》 presented at Art Space Geumcheon in 2019. The poster of SAD with the blue sky in the background takes a similar form as the ones to promote the university where he works as professor. This poster, which catches our eyes with the blue sky and the cloud mark of the airplane up in the sky, attributes to the university a role of a ‘railroad switchman’ 2) who suggests a bright future to students.

    Fong asks.
    What does it mean to learn art at a university? How concretely does the future we imagine show us our reality?

    The form of the SAD works aims at the conceptual art based on specific factual information. Through the works, he clearly states his social status, which is a university professor, and manipulates the interpretative judgmental awareness of viewers by inverting the social image of artist and professor. He presents the schema to execute the ‘way to become a successful artist’ covering the entire wall, and asks back to the viewer/participant the essence and the critical judgment hidden behind the work. Through question and answer process about the value that building one’s career as an artist should obtain, the participants in this project got to connect the social relationships into an ar-bitrary structure, not by learning. In addition, in the success schema of the art world that Fong analyzes, the Korean society is presented as a competitive ranking structure with a satire on its pervading rankism. Through the project of “Info Day” of SAD subtitled as “For a Better Success”, he questions if art and artist can ever develop by education and learning, and reveals the gap between the essence of art and its intended goal in the reality.

    In 2020 at Cheongju Art Studio, he expanded the steps of the way to success as an artist in SAD project into the stages of sales and dis-tribution of artworks. He attempted to structuralize the way of becoming a successful artist through the method of marketing and to interpret the artistic value.

    Fong found the boom of TV home shopping a unique social and cultural phenomenon of Korea, unlike Hong Kong. In the Korean society where the on-line commerce is much activated through mobile platforms and social media, the majority of customers using TV home shop-ping in Korea are middle-aged or older female consumers. Many of middle-aged or older consumers prefer TV home shopping because of its simple access with just one remote controller. Therefore, the advertising copy for them should be phrased simple and clear; Fong’s exhibition also adopted the expressions like ‘Only one on earth!’, ‘One in the world!’, ‘Recommended by the expert curator!’, and ‘Transfor-mation of a boring space into a gallery!’ which aim to delude customers. Of course, all this process in the work of Fong takes place in the exhibition venue. The artist invited the professional show host as the performer of his project to show the circulating method of art as com-mercial goods by reproducing a TV home shopping program in the exhibition space. The showy speech of show host and the clear ad-vertising copies covering all over the screen is no different from the actual home shopping channel program in reality. Walking a fine line between real and virtual, this project directs the position of artist, art piece, collector and viewer in an unconventional way. The reconstitution of a studio that produces an art rental home shopping program, thickly covered with only the marketing terms to sell the art pieces rather than to convey the essential value of the work, invites us to see the reality of art museums of our time from a critical perspective

    <Greeting for Artists>, a sound installation to learn the common conversing manners used in the art world, describes the meaning hidden behind the actual said, yet still expressed in the intonation of Korean language, through social relational psychology. Fong is fond of this kind of unique psychological tug-of-war that can attract the attention of viewers/participants. (2008-2010) that he created at the very starting point of his career as an artist is also a video work that recorded people in the elevator during the short time of 6 seconds when the doors remain open on the 6th floor of a 40-story building in Hong Kong. Through this tug-of-war of gaze between the object, the people who are placed in a slightly different position each time the doors open, and the artist, he mischievously questions whose time it is. Fong induces some questions: Is the time acquired in a justifiable way (he had the right to stop the elevator by pushing the stop button) really justifiable? Is the materialization of the immaterial that can happen in the system of art, which is also a process of com-mercialization, (he resold DVDs containing the video filmed in such way) justifiable? Whose time was he selling?

    One of his works that particularly attracted my attention was that he presented at the Hong Kong Art Center in 2015. He reconstituted his living space at the exhibition venue perfectly as it was including the shape, sound and lighting, and let the viewers/participants expe-rience that space for 10 minutes, after they pledged some code of conduct to be observed in the exhibition space. Through the promise with the viewer to follow the pre-decided regulation by the artist, he hides the time of the viewer/participant as well as the time of the artist himself in the form of the exhibition and questions back to the viewers what art is. It seems that he intended to twist the value of art suggested at the limit of conceptual art, highlighting the forced appreciation and enjoyment of art pieces and the one-sidedness of their experience.

    His art is aiming at the conceptual art, but he rearranges in time certain immaterial things such as video, letter, text and sound, and makes use of the structure of relational psychology that connects Langue and Parole in the works, and the artist and the viewer in the society.

    He regards his exhibitions as a place to build an ecosystem of art. Also the artist summons the viewer as a co-creator of his social exper-iment. His works are always based on a pre-determined scenario, but they do look like a real society including variable and constant, be-cause the artistic awareness of the participants has to be placed in his works. The information presented in Fong’s works is mostly undefinable as truth. Moreover, the gaze observing those pieces of information is also made in the social relationships, in the social con-ventions and their cultural background. Particularly, his observation to reveal the relation between the art and the society of our time is caustically critical and paradoxical. In the explanatory note of the exhibition, he said “SAD is a recurrent observation in the art community, self-awareness, and critique.” However, even someone who has the eyes of truth, if looking through a broken mirror, would see the frag-ments of images reflecting a distorted consciousness.

    The works of Silas Fong, reflecting the consciousness about the problems that the art world of Korea is facing in reality, are not to be un-derstood from some art theories or common art perspectives, but to be perceived as a work of critical interpretation of our art society. His works invite us to realize that a new interpretation of art can obtain the justification, through our eyes as an observer summoned as viewer/participant to this event.

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    1) In the interpretative sociology, we try to answer the questions such as ‘How is the meaning born and preserved in a social system?’, ‘How does the cultural background (norm, value, assumption taken for granted) influence on people’s decision?’ and ‘What does a specific piece of art mean?’ Max Weber, through the concept of ‘switchman metaphor’ believed that when people decide something, they behave legally according to their individual understanding. The meaning of reasonable choice, namely the profit, is based on the culture or concept.


    2) Weber said ‘Not ideas, but material and ideal interests directly govern men’s conduct. Yet very frequently the ‘world-images’ that have been created by ‘ideas’ have, like switchmen, determined the tracks along which action has been pushed by the dynamic of interest.??The perspective of interpretative sociologists of ‘believing is seeing’ is often efficiently used to help understanding the meaning of a piece of art and how people produce a meaning out of a piece of art.

  • What Makes Art Art?

    SAD School of Artists Development: Silas Fong

    Leeji Hong (Curator, National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art)

    2020

    There is a Korean expression ‘nunchi (literally eye-measuring)’ commonly used by Koreans. Similarly, in Japan they say ‘read the air’. It means sensing the atmosphere of a situation and gauging others’ mind or attitude without being awkward. In an artistic category as well, we try to measure others’ mind. Nunchi for success, nunchi for relationship – Silas Fong has constantly been interested in certain contexts that have been accepted and tacitly agreed in the name of the art. Such interest may be derived from the fact that he is multilingual; his mother tongue is Cantonese, he teaches students in English at a Korean art school, and speaks German at home. Understanding language, culture and sentiments requires highly developed concentration and experience to read the air and measure minds subtly. This is similar to habits of the art. The atmosphere and context, intrinsic to art, is hard to be explained in letters or words or to be grasped at once, and presupposes comprehensive understanding and information. One step away from the representational thought and subjective value judgement of art, Fong tried to suggest an objective index based on very realistic and rational judgment on art, in order to objectify the process of analyzing the meaning and value of art. For many years, he has been interested in the expressions suitable for each situation and the conversation method to set up relationships for social life, and also produced small publications in that matter. <Small Talk> (2018) and <Vocabulary> (2019) contain the expressions adapted to each situation, to lead the atmosphere avoiding awkwardness. Through this work, the artist observed the expressions that people use commonly and inertially to set up a relationship, and suggested a sort of guideline to get adapted to a circumstance without being awkward. This interest of Fong in language and attitude has evolved into his concern about the formal expression method and representation of the intrinsic attributes and meaning of education and art, which he has experienced as a professor of an art university in Korea in 2017.        

    SAD School of Artists Development

    Silas Fong’s SAD (School of Artists Development, hereinafter ‘SAD’) was first introduced at <SAD Info Days> held at Seoul Art Space Geumcheon in 2019. <SAD Info Days (hereinafter ‘Info Days’)> is planned to announce the beginning of the SAD project and deal with the role of artist and the ambivalent aspects of art through this. <Info Days> held on 19 – 31 July 2019, provided the SAD programs such as the basics for portrait of artist, how to complete application forms, international art English class, and specialized course for SAD career development. During the event, SAD also arranged a portfolio review session for rising artists and students who are aspiring artists. To objectify and analyze ‘visual artist’ and also to play that role, Fong attempted to divide his role into educator, observer and performer, eventually to reconsider the fundamental meaning of art. Through <SAD Info Days>, subtitled ‘For a Better Success’, Fong questioned ‘Can art and artist be developed by education and learning?’ and intended to examine the essence of art as well as the other side of art. The artist suggests the exhibition space as a platform to perform ‘the way to be a successful artist’ and asks back the viewers/participants the hidden essence of this project and the critical judgment on it. Furthermore, he also proposes the figure of an artist, which other people think ‘an artist should be’, the steps to succeed as an artist, and the basic survival skills to be adapted to the ecosystem of Korean art world. Then he asks again whether these things can be acquired through education and information.      

    Silas Fong presented the new curriculum and program of SAD during his stay as artist-in-residency at Cheongju Art Studio in the year of 2020. At this second edition of SAD, Fong went forward to the next level from how to become an artist and the basic conditions for an artist to possess, to expand his interest to the artwork and its collection, the production of value of artwork as goods. Organizing spaces according to 3 works, Fong installed a studio where the students participating in SAD can practice the skills to promote and sell the art rental service through home shopping TV channel. Silas Fong, the founder of SAD who has been constantly dealing with the ecology of art and the nature of art since 2019, sometimes directly yet subtly, proposed <SAD Theory> and introduced his way of revealing the phenomenon by twisting the snobbish attribute of art and the social convention around it, taking the art collection as an example. He expresses with humor, but by adopting indirect methods and attitudes, he points out the excessively standardized conditions to become successful as an artist, and paradoxically reveals that now it is time to reexamine the practice of such series of processes which are so familiar that we got tamed with them. The second work <Greetings for Artists> is a sound installation work that Fong created to learn the general knowledge commonly used in art world. It aims to reconsider the nuance of Korean language and the ‘greeting’ culture. Fong describes the delicate nuance and culture that are so familiar to us that we never mention. He experienced them living in Korea since 2017, through his dual status of a foreign artist who should present his works and persuade the Korean art world, and at the same time a professor who teaches art to students in English, which is not the mother tongue for him. Lastly, he presented <SAD Shop> which is a window exhibition where we can also buy various artworks. The Shop consists of <The Artist’s Plant>, <Artist Career Map>, <Media Artist Starter Kit> and <Greeting Tote>. The public can actually purchase the goods proposed by the artist and also the Shop itself is an artwork. The work implies the ambivalent and paradoxical aspect and prejudice often found in the contemporary art which divides the commercial and non-commercial, with an ambiguity between pretense and sincerity. Through this experiment, the artist urges to rethink about how the hegemony of an exhibition space is created. An exhibition is a place to evaluate a posteriori the act of the artist and the artwork that has already left the workspace, where innumerable ideologies and political discourses indwell.

    What Makes Art Art?

    After all, Silas Fong prompts to maintain temporarily the ideological conflict and irony in the context of art, rather than to accept the position of artist and the place for art to stay in a metaphorical, inertial way. By this, he urges eventually to reveal the snobbery through the space of white cube – as Brian O’Doherty suggested in ‘Inside the White Cube’ – and to reexamine the persistent habit of self-definition. The artist stated in his explanation of the exhibition that “SAD is the result of a continuous observation of artists in the art world and the result of self-awareness and criticism.” These experiments and trials of Fong remind us of the words of Arthur Danto: “to see something as art requires something the eye cannot descry – an atmosphere of artistic theory, a knowledge of the history of art: an artworld”. The most important lesson we learned from the 21st century, is that if we don’t do anything, there is no change. Witnessing the things taken for granted disappearing and collapsing instantly, wouldn’t Silas Fong like to say that, if we act and think in an inertial way without any doubt in the matter of creation, the place of art, in which we have believed so firmly, would also be easily fading, and that it is the reason why our choice has a great importance?     

  • SAD Kitchen – Oi! Guide: A Comfort Food Journey

    Solo Exhibition at Oi!, Hong Kong, 1 Sep 2023 – 7 Jan 2024

    In my recent project “SAD Kitchen: Oi! Guide – A Comfort Food Journey,” I utilized 3D printed objects, 3D scanning, animation, wall vinyl, printed matters and installation art to transform the Oi! Warehouse into a multi-sensory “kitchen.” This interactive space invites visitors to explore personal emotions and communal bonds through a site-specific game. Hidden psychological test questions were integrated into the 3D objects and animated features, encouraging self-reflection. Visitors received a personalized “Comfort Food Guide,” pointing them to local dishes in the North Point community. My art aims to use food—and digital media—as vehicles for social and cultural construction, connecting people, places, and stories.

  • SAD School of Artists Development, Department of Bread

    Solo Exhibition at Gallery Chosun, Seoul, 6 – 29 Nov 2024

    The SAD School of Artists Development, Department of Bread transforms bread-making into a satirical exploration of education and validation systems, critiquing the relentless pursuit of credentials in a society fixated on external measures of success. Through workshops like Flourglass, where flour and time slip away in futile races against the clock, and the Shape and Score Clinic, where dough is shaped but never allowed to rise, the project playfully exposes the absurdities of institutional pressures. Surreal photographs from the Stretch series, blending yoga poses with intertwined masses of dough, reflect the balancing act between external expectations and raw creativity. By focusing on process over results, the work challenges visitors to question how institutions shape value and meaning, offering a humorous yet reflective critique of a system where showing up often matters more than true learning or growth.

  • 成功藝術家指南

    Media. 信報
    Date. 2020-09-02
    Text. 張綺霞

    https://www1.hkej.com//dailynews/culture/article/2567721/%E6%88%90%E5%8A%9F%E8%97%9D%E8%A1%93%E5%AE%B6%E6%8C%87%E5%8D%97

    在韓國教書後,Silas對藝術教育有更多反思,例如他要教導學生如何將創作變成事業。「我也不算很成功的藝術家,卻要教學生如何去『成功』。韓國藝術家很依賴資助,因此一些藝術家會教學生寫計劃書的技巧,卻讓學生的作品不自覺地迎合這些資助的要求和喜好。」

    他以此創作了一個虛構藝術學校,裏面全是可笑的「成為成功藝術家指南」。「究竟什麼才是成功?某程度上,所謂成功也是運氣使然,因為時機適合,讓他們的作品能在重要的展覽展出,有重要的藝術評論和策展人寫文章推介。但這是否成功唯一的定義?」

    雖然未算成功,但他在韓國的創作機會愈來愈多,太太在語言和生活上幫助他不少,他笑言,兩人之間也有良性競爭。「例如清州駐留計劃,我們各自也有申請和入選。」雖然她是畫畫為主,但兩人也會經常看對方的作品,給些意見。他笑道:「通常都是她請我說我才說,說到某些位見好就收,讓對方自己想一想。所以我們從未為作品問題吵架。」

    早前方琛宇在首爾衿川藝術空間舉辦個人展「SAD Info Days」,為嘉賓講解作品。(受訪者圖片)
  • Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening (An Excerpt)

    Lambda prints, table, sound
    Size variable
    2020

    A rearrangement from the exhibition with the same title exploring the possibility of spaces within and between images. Fong borrows the title of a poem by Robert Frost and loosely associates it with his life in foreign places. The audience is free to arrange the image sequence for their own reading.

  • Enjoy Your Meal!

    Exhibited at Duddell’s, Hong Kong, 2 Aug – 23 Sep 2018
    Clothing, Dummy, Plastic Food Model
    2018

    In 1959, Mark Rothko accepted a commission from Four Seasons restaurant in New York City. “I hope to paint something that will ruin the appetite of every son of a bitch who ever eats in that room”. Sounds dramatic enough, but he failed and returned the money because he found that ‘people can stand anything these days’. I was curious about what I could do in a high-end restaurant, while contributing to the context of this exhibition.
    Enjoy Your Meal! is a scene recreated to depict the McRefugee phenomenon and the problem of extreme shortage in affordable housing situation in Hong Kong.

    During the opening of the exhibition, visitors around Enjoy Your Meal!
  • Introduction to International Art English (IAE)

    Exhibited at
    SAD Info Days, PS333, Seoul Art Space Geumcheon, Seoul
    19-31 July 2019

    2019
    LED display panel, art magazines
    250 x 100 x 10 cm, size variable

    Artists, curators and critics used popular art jargons to decorate their writings and artworks. It might sound more professional, contextualized, more important than it is but difficult to be understood. These jargons pop up on the LED display like an attractive billboard. One keeps looking without reading a word from it. The LED panel is supported by piles of important art magazines borrowed from the archive of Seoul Art Space Geumcheon. Visitors could pick up the magazine but they would bear the risk to make the panel fall.

  • Small Talk

    Sample Conversations for Your Perfect Date and Successful Meeting

    Exhibited at Duddell’s, Hong Kong, 2 Aug – 23 Sep 2018
    Booked 2019: Tai Kwun Contemporary Hong Kong Art Book Fair

    Artist’s book
    15 cm × 10 cm × 1.5 cm, 100 pages
    2018

    Small Talk is a small coffee-table book that visitors can flip through while having a drink and chatting with their peers. Instead of
    beautiful and colorful pictures, this book collects pre-written dialogues, offers for the visitors to act out when they run out of words.

    For this special occasion, aims for a practical use in social situations. Readers could choose from a list of sample conversations
    collected from anonymous source and improvise when they are running out of words. At the same time, the book also arouses reader’s awareness
    of the surrounding socio-physical setting.

  • Artist Career Map

    Exhibited at
    SAD Info Days, PS333, Seoul Art Space Geumcheon, Seoul
    19-31 July 2019
    Make: Experiments in Art Making, Platform-L Contemporary Art Center, Seoul
    1-12 October 2019

    Vinyl on Wall
    1400 cm x 300 cm
    2019

    SAD School of Artists Development presents the Artist Career Map, an insightful career path for emerging artists in South Korea. With this grand picture, young artists can easily set their destination and choose the fastest way to achieve. SAD arranges the sections such as education, overseas, artist’s run space in hierarchical order. Higher position on the map indicates a higher status. SAD systematically ranks lists of institutions from the best to the worst.
    Artist Career Map is not a comprehensive map but apparent pathways through important organizations.