Art journal #78: Wu Guanzhong @ HK Museum of Art

Its a show where the HK MOA has an incumbent advantage over other worldclass museums - Wu had been giving works to and showing in HK since 2 decades ago.

There's finally a bit of thoughts going into the display. The idea to frame Wu's HK sketch done in 2003 onto the window looking to the Victoria Harbor is good. The mounting of his "swallow" painting onto the walls of the entrance with a matching real door looking into the exhibition space was also a joy to see.

The curating was pedestrian though - I thought MOA could have borrowed works from others (collectors, other museums) to make it a more complete and thoughtful shows. Right now its just a collection and not more, which I thought was a wasted opportunity to do a good show.

All that said, the show still clearly drew crowds - I seldom see as many foreign tourists at a MOA show, in addition to the locals.

The museum shop is a disgrace though - it put out its old stock of over-priced non-editioned Wu Guanzhong prints in its usual disorganised way. There's a new catalog for the show but no thoughtful critiques in it. There's no half-decent merchandises (vs. the great stuff I saw in Taiwan on the Cai Guoqiang show). HK's got to work on this! Yes I do think retail IS part of the art experience...!