Lau Siu Chung: Let’s go somewhere

EVENT DESCRIPTION

For the first time at Gallery EXIT, Lau Siu Chung exhibits a new series of large-scale oil paintings, created from everyday sceneries around the artist, who has captured his impressions of the momentous urban landscapes and street happenings, bringing a unique viewing experience with constantly changing lines and layered compositions.

Let’s go somewhere, as suggested by the exhibition title, is about the artist’s personal travel experience, and how living in a busy city, he has a particular yearning for nature in the countryside due to recent changes in the mode of travel as a result of the pandemic.

Some of the works are based on the Hong Kong cityscape inhabited by the artist, whose persona often figures in the paintings, leading the viewers into the busy streets from a first- person perspective. At the same time, natural elements such as trees and parks are constant motifs in the artist’s creation. Other works highlight Lau’s family outings and the natural landscapes perceived therein. The series resembles a portrait of the artist’s everyday life, reflecting his change of mood as he traverses from city to nature.

The large-scale oil painting The Hiking Fever is the first completed work in this series, rendered from a urban perspective, overlooking the neighbouring hills. Large swaths of hillside occupy the central pane, looming large amidst the surrounding city architecture, echoing the artist’s yearning for the countryside while exhibiting the unique landscape of Hong Kong where the boundary between urban and rural is often blurred.

The Enclosure series documents the park facilities frequented by the artist and his daughter, which are sealed off with barricade tape during the pandemic, when the most ordinary of daily activities are forcefully ground to a halt. The park facilities are right there, yet out of reach.

In High Island Reservoir East Dam, Lau extends his landscape to the suburbs of Sai Kung in the New Territories, where the pleasant sojourn to High Island Reservoir East Dam with family and friends is portrayed in pastel tones. On the upper left, the disproportionately giant kite is particularly eye-catching. Together with the enlarged dolos blocks on the breakwater, they constitute the most poignant details in the artist’s memory. Yet even here barricade tapes find their way into the countryside: Even when one escapes into the wild, there is no ridding of the constraints of reality.