Hot Concrete: LA to HK by K11 MUSEA

Hot Concrete: LA to HK is the first major group exhibition of Los Angeles-based artists in Hong Kong and is on view at K11 MUSEA from 21 October to 13 November 2022. Sponsored and supported by UBS, H. Moser & Cie, and Ruinart, the exhibition is curated by Sow & Tailor (Los Angeles), presented by K11 MUSEA (Hong Kong), and WOAW Gallery (Hong Kong), and co-organised by Ouyang Art Consulting (Los Angeles). Hot Concrete: LA to HK is the second iteration of Sow & Tailor's inaugural exhibition with an expanded selection of thirty artists and over fifty-five artworks. As the epicentre for creativity both in Asia and internationally, Hong Kong enthusiastically welcomes the explosive creativity of Los Angeles and the breadth and rigour of its multidisciplinary and multi-generational artists. 

This exhibition's unique curatorial perspective uses the four major principles of ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangement, as its point of departure. This showcase is not only a bridge that connects two significant artistic hubs and geographies, but it also provides Hong  Kong’s art-viewing public with a glimpse into the current creative energy of Los Angeles and its limitless opportunities for exploration, innovation, and self-fashioning. Hot Concrete fosters cultural exchange whilst injecting the vibrancy of Los Angeles into Hong Kong’s cultural landscape.

The multi-generational exhibition presents a diverse array of artists positioned at various points in their careers, defining an important moment in Los Angeles’s creative history. This exciting show is also multidisciplinary, featuring a wide range of talents and their creations such as sculpture, installation, video, painting, and furniture design. Hot Concrete's artists represent Los Angeles’s unique position as a place where a multiplicity of cultures coexist and flourish. They reflect on their personal histories and lived experiences as minorities, children of diaspora, first-generation citizens, and immigrants in their practice. Abound in this exhibition are references to California’s vernacular cultures, including car culture, murals, and graffiti found on overpasses, bridges, and the concrete walls of the LA River, or signage on "mom-and-pop" shops in ethnic pockets.

All the artists are community-oriented and socially engaged, interrogating class, gender, race, identity, and alternative subcultures, such as skating, surfing, lowrider, and graffiti - all of which add to the colourful fabric of the city. They turn inwards while looking at their city’s unique history. Like Los Angeles, Hong Kong is a bustling metropolis shaped by a fusion of disparate cultures. The work of Hot Concrete’s artists serves as a reminder for Hong Kong audiences to reflect on their personal histories, their relationship to the city, and the communities that shape it. This show continues the creative legacy of generations of cultural workers using the sprawling city’s vibrant landscape, physical and cultural, and its history, both chaotic and harmonious, as a reference. While often personal, nostalgic, and emblematic of the locale in which it is made, the work of these artists finds parallels globally. 

About K11 MUSEA
Launched in 2019, K11 MUSEA is the new cultural-retail destination on Victoria Dockside, Hong Kong. It sits on the site formerly known as Holt’s Wharf, an important go-down in Tsim Sha Tsui that dates to 1910. K11 MUSEA is the result of ten years of planning and building by K11 Group founder and entrepreneur Adrian Cheng. Cheng’s vision is to reinvigorate Hong Kong’s waterfront with one hundred creative powers and make K11 MUSEA the Silicon Valley of culture that will inspire global millennials and facilitate a broader discussion on the interconnectedness of creativity, culture, and innovation. K11  hopes to usher in a new era of cultural retail which speaks to the growing consumer demand for naturally immersive experiences of art, culture, nature, and commerce. Inspired by 'A Muse by the Sea',  K11 MUSEA is designed to enrich the new consumer’s daily life through the power of creativity, culture, and innovation. 

Exhibition Dates: 21 October - 13 November 2022
Address: 6F, Kunsthalle, K11 MUSEA
Opening Hours:
Mon-Fri: 11am-7pm
Sat, Sun, Public Holidays: 11am-8pm

All images are courtesy of K11 MUSEA and Woaw Gallery