A group of promising young Chinese artists offers a stimulating representation of the media art scene today through 40 fascinating new media artworks to be exhibited at City University of Hong Kong (CityU) beginning 24 March.

The exhibition, titled “On the Road: Young Media Artists in China,” will feature the works of 36 young artists selected from major contemporary art institutes and art organisations in mainland China and Hong Kong. 

Nine of the artists are from Hong Kong and six are CityU graduates. In addition, six young faculty members from the School of Creative Media (SCM) at CityU are contributing new media artworks to the show.

The exhibition will showcase how these young artists have moved beyond the idea of “new” versus “old” media, seamlessly combining art and technology. The works also reflect the breadth of knowledge, aesthetic framework and academic contexts of the generation born after the 1970s and 1980s.

First held at the Guan Shanyue Art Museum in Shenzhen last November, the exhibition comes to CityU in an expanded version following extremely positive reviews.

Under the curatorship of Professor Maurice Benayoun from SCM, this vast exhibition fills the CityU Exhibition Gallery as well as two exhibition spaces at SCM, offering an ambitious overview of the current state of media art created by a younger generation.

Officiating guests at the opening ceremony on 23 March included Professor Way Kuo, President of CityU; Mr Qian Qiang, Deputy Director of the Shenzhen Municipal Bureau of Culture, Sports and Tourism; Mr Wu Hongliang, Deputy Director and Chief Secretary of the Curatorial Committee of the Chinese Artists Association, and Associate Dean of the Beijing Art Academy; and Professor Benayoun.

Professor Kuo said in his welcoming remarks that he would like to thank the Guan Shanyue Art Museum for its support, and welcomed the young artists from the mainland to participate in the exhibition.

Mr Qian thanked CityU for providing support to the exhibition. He hoped that there would be further collaboration between each other, and development of collaborative projects in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Bay Area.

For the last decade, the new media art scene has grown in size and quality in China, a country highly receptive to innovation. Its own rich and unique history of image-making, painting and calligraphy offers a tradition where time and space, black and white, sound and silence are often juxtaposed in a subtle dialogue made of contrast and complicity. Building on this tradition, young Chinese media artists are digging new paths that leave firm tracks across the drowsy field of contemporary art.

All these remarkable exhibits and the list of artists can be found at the website: cityu.edu.hk/ontheroad/. 

The exhibition is co-organised by CityU, the Guan Shanyue Art Museum in Shenzhen and the Curatorial Committee of the Chinese Artists Association of the Museum. Details of the exhibition are: 

CityU has organised a number of new media art exhibitions that lie at the intersection of the arts and technology, offering fresh perspectives on the displays and providing interactive experiences for the visitors. The exhibited projects include cross-cultural work by the Italian painter Giuseppe Castiglione; the cultural legacy and future of Hakka kung fu; unpublished handwritten materials by well-known Tsinghua scholars; and innovative new media technology and 3D visualisation on Lingnan Hung Kuen. The SCM at CityU is a leading institution in the field of media art, supporting education, creation, and research innovation in Hong Kong and mainland China.

Guan Shanyue Art Museum initiated the “On the Road: Nomination Exhibition of Chinese Young Artists Works & Forum of Young Art Critics” project in 2013, planning it as a six-year programme. Over the past four years, it has focused on separate materials, with past themes including oil and ink paintings, prints and sculpture. This year is the first time that the exhibition has focused on new media, revealing how young artists are combining technology and art in their creative work.