Pearl Lam Galleries' SOHO branch in Hong Kong is showcasing London-based conceptual artists Revital Cohen and Tuur Van Balen for the first time in the city. Curated by David Ho Yeung Chan, the exhibition “Mass” will run through July 15.The collaborative duo explores the quantities, nature and spirituality of precious materials used in mass reproduced objects. The two artists are recognized for working with objects, installations and film to look into the cultural, political and ethical dynamics of production.The technological gadgets we use on a daily basis, for instance, are the product of the transformation of rare and valuable minerals. Yet, we know very little about the cultural and social reality in which they are made. Cohen and Van Balen lay these matters bare while reflecting on the impact of industrialization.In this exhibition, the artworks offer geopolitical maps and studies of substances that make up industrial objects. For example, the artists’ recent series entitled “Itchy Palm Trees,” 2016, consists of linear neon sculptures coated in rare earth minerals mined from skeletons in Siberia, which are traded primarily in Hong Kong.The artists sum up the aim of the created artworks as a way to address the “tensions between manufactured landscapes and the landscapes of manufacturing.” The duo are interested in modifying the way industrial supply chains and modes of mass production are perceived. To achieve this, they attempt to uncover traces of rites from these raw materials by deconstructing the cyclical transformations that the materials went through.In the artists' own words, as quoted in the press release: “The transformation of things across dreams and geologies, through planetary leaps as economic forces, push deep into the soil to unearth animal and mineral matter or look up towards mining the moon, in circular motions from ashes to gold to dust.”"Mass" runs through July 15 at Pearl Lam Galleries Hong Kong SOHO.
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