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Installation view of Chuang Chong Yong’s Storeys, 2003, at Valentine Willie Fine Art, KL
Bangsar gallery, Valentine Willie Fine Art, shelves plans to move down town to Central Market’s Annexe building, clearing up the thick swirl of rumours surrounding the future direction of one of Malaysia’s leading commercial spaces.
Moving came into consideration, after 12 years of making a semi-institutional household name for itself on Bangsar’s Telawi 3 street, as the gallery faces rent increase from stiff competition against the inundation of independent boutique start-ups that have transformed the upper middle class suburb into a small but discerning fashion hub.
The gallery, which currently occupies two first floor shop lots, will revert back to a one unit exhibition space. Plans also include setting up an stockroom and storage facility in the adjacent residential area.
What spurred a change of mind despite official press confirmation released as recent as KLue magazine’s november issue?
‘Every space needs time to grow and develop its audience. Moving to a new location necessitates rebranding the gallery and this will take up a lot of time and resources,’ explains gallery manager, Snow Ng, ‘Because the operational scale of moving a gallery is no small feat, after a long period of extensive consideration, we felt that more preparation is needed before an operation as massive as this can be undertaken.’
In spite of the scale-down, Valentine Willie leads the charge with a burst of optimism, promising a tighter, leaner and more focused programme. The big names in the gallery’s stable returns prominently to VWFA’s exhibition calendar, with mid-career star painters such as Jalaini Abu Hassan and Kow Leong Kiang staging comeback solos after successful showings in Indonesia over the past years.
Willie, who also runs three other commercial galleries in Manila, Singapore and Yogyakarta, also welcomes the art market turnabout that is evidenced in the strong results achieved in the November Christie’s Southeast Asian Modern and Contemporary Art auction in Hong Kong. 2009 second half pick up in the Malaysia art market also indicate confident recovery in local art collecting and investment scene, with both markets mirroring the beginning of a global market upswing forecasted in this week’s The Economist‘s 14-page special report on the art market.
Perhaps because a large part of the Malaysian middle class is cushioned from the economic downturn this year, the gallery going public has never been so spoilt for choice – depends on how you see it, we are either empowered or rendered indecisive for the first time in the history of our cultural life – having to choose which opening to attend, with many of them falling on the same night, week after week.
Meanwhile, Bangsar’s relevance as the commercial centre of the visual arts remains and will only increase. Recently opened ware-house art space, ZINC, joins the ranks of existing commercial spaces – Pelita Hati, Richard Koh Fine Art, VWFA and further out in Brickfields and Damansara Heights respectively, Wei-Ling Gallery and Galeri Chandan – that will hopefully offer a more sophisticated variety of exhibitions, reflecting the gradual diversification of shows one is set to encounter in Kuala Lumpur next year.
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(SS)
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Are they closing down the project room?
Having attempted to access one exhibition at Central Market Annex, I am so glad that VWFA have changed their minds.
At the risk of being called a ‘snob’ yet again, I didn’t feel that the annex was a suitable venue for such an up-market gallery.
No disrespect to Central Market Annex, but it is telling that I have been there once, recently, and to the Bangsar gallery many many times, even though, technically, for me, it is more difficult to reach.
Heh to me it does but heck Yusuf:P if we are here in arteri and in the art world, it’s because we are elitists in pursuit of higher things in life.
I guess how we define ‘high’ is the tricky bit eversince Dada types flipped everything side-up down. In another example, I remain ‘goatse’ and a variety of nicks because I think it allows for me to present my ideas without others and myself worrying who or where in the art scene I am coming from or trying to go. I just want to get my ideas across without prejudice or slef-promotional interest. Excuse me again if it came across as mere mud slinging and personal attacks. I am very interested to hear more on your ideas on art.
Since we’ve already migrated our mini debate, I would also like to add that my position on ‘reviews’ is also the opposite of yours. Normally, I would not read wall labels, artist, or curator’s texts either but in the case of a review, i think it would be more interesting that after the initial ‘innocent eye’ viewing of the show, I’d scrutinize the published literature. It’s necessary simply to verify basic facts that will be retransmitted to the viewer, as well as to allow for more communal debate over culture. Of course, it’s not necessary to do this all the time, probably not necessary at all for a free blog submission, but I wouldn’t be brave as to use the word ‘never’.
dear Ming,
As far as I’m aware of, there will no longer be a project room. Shame.
Best
Simon
Then ‘Goatse’ our differences are made manifest.
I reiterate that it is the exhibitions that I wish to review, that I do not read the reviews to, until after writing. Not all reviews.
It is too easy to be influenced by others’ ideas, style etc. It was the way I was taught, and it works for me.
As for ‘facts’ surely they are gained from visiting the exhibition and research, rather than others’ reviews.
High and Low, yes spurious concepts at the best of times – as the exhibition of that very same name indicated – 1990.
True, Dada, and later Surrealism, turned the Art world on its head – they were, after all, the part of the origins of so-called post-modernism. ‘Art’ became more inclusive of other ideas, other cultures, subjectivity, psychoanalysis.
However for ‘Art’to really be free it had to also break away from the tyranny of Andre Breton. To some extent Salvidor Dali, that showman, egoist and George Bataille pointed the way.