Bearing witness: Contemporary Asian art from the NGV Collection
In these works, artists across Asia and its diasporas address history and social change, transforming the body, language and visual traditions into forms of resistance. Huang Yan paints a classical shänshu™ landscape onto skin, merging centuries-old pictorial traditions with contemporary image-making. Qiu Zhijie reinterprets the gestures of Cultural Revolution imagery to reflect on the communal dreams of the era and the realities that fo lowed. Zhang Huan overlays faces with written characters, linking personal identity to rapid urban transformation and the loss of familiar environments.
Others examine how political authority and social pressures shape identity more directly. FX Harsono revisits the forced suppression of Chinese Indonesian names, reasserting his own through the use of ink, brush and photography. Xiao Lu documents public protests in Hong Kong, while Yee I-Lann depicts the displacement of indigenous communities in Sabah due to urbanisation and palm oil plantations. Haris Purnomo commemorates disappeared political activists by inscribing their names as a record of social memory.
Together, these works highlight how personal stories intersect with state power, migration, protest and memory, situating identity within broader historical and
geopolitical contexts.
Xiao Lu’s work “Protest” on NGV show
