Hello World!
I was just writing to a friend who wants to move to Hong Kong, to work as a fundraiser in the expanding Arts Field of this city, mainly “because the government are currently investing millions developing a new ‘arts and cultural quarter’ there”.
Of course, I told her that fundraisers for the arts are ALWAYS needed… ANYWHERE… and that the art world of Hong Kong seemed fine to me, if you do not take the art part too seriously… As far as I understand, these iniciatives are mostly about the “cultural Industries” (I write the I as a capital letter only, not the c). At least that is what I learned from what happened in the 798 district in Beijing… And I cannot imagine Shanghai or Honk Kong to be better off, in this sense…
To be honest, I am a bit fed up with this kind of Emerging Markets Mentality in the art world, especially in China. Call me an elitist, but I just think that the growing Disneyfication and NASDAQuisation of the art word is not good for neither the arts, nor the artists, nor the public, on the long run. It is only good for the art collectors, a development pretty similar to what is going on everywhere else… was I just inspired because I had just seen (better late than never) Let’s Make Money by the Austrian documentary film-maker Erwin Wagenhofer? Again, call me an arrogant Eurocentric elitist swine. But at least I have created a new word… when looking up NASDAQuisation on Google I found 0 (ZEEERO!!!) Matches, something that happens very seldomly. If anybody knows how to make BIG BUCKS out of my invention, please tell me, ASAP.
All the best, Moritz
THE CURATOR SHIP 