M+, Asia’s global museum of contemporary visual culture in the West Kowloon Cultural District in Hong Kong, is pleased to announce the new exhibition Making It Matters, opening to the public on Saturday, 2 November 2024 in the M+ Open Gallery. Drawn from the M+ Collections, this exhibition examines making as a process of creative expression and its long-lasting impact on individual lives, global communities, and fragile ecosystems.
Making It Matters mostly draws upon the diverse works of the M+ Collections. The artists, designers, and architects featured include John Cage, Harold Cohen, Julie & Jesse, John Maeda, Raffaella della Olga, Anna Ridler, Ki Saigon, Fujimori Terunobu, Jay Sae Jung Oh, Stanley Wong, and Võ Trọng Nghĩa Architects. It follows the process of making from concept and research to design and fabrication, as well as the social networks that link each step. By delving into the inspirations, techniques, and impacts behind the selected works, the exhibition helps us understand our own roles in processes of making and their relation to our daily lives.
The exhibition also looks at responsible design, material innovation, and creative reuse strategies adopted by innovative makers exploring alternative modes of thinking. These ideas are situated within wider historical and sociopolitical contexts across four thematic sections:
Ceramics: A Story of Shifting Values explores the complex and layered history of ceramics and focuses on how one material can shift greatly in value and perception over time. The section begins with the kilns of Jingdezhen in China and follows the development of blue-and-white ceramics over centuries. The section serves as a prelude to the three facets of making that the exhibition explores—material experimentation, the evolution of tools, and consumerism’s impacts on our environment. Highlights include a Qing dynasty vase with tubular handles and lotus design in underglaze blue on loan from the Hong Kong Museum of Art; an armorial ware dish with coat of arms and overglaze famille rose enamels on loan from the Chinese University of Hong Kong; and a contemporary re-imagining of blue-and-white ceramics by Ni Haifeng from the M+ Sigg Collection, titled Of the Departure and the Arrival (2005).
Material Potential highlights how makers experiment with a variety of materials, including neon, resin, and bamboo, discovering new processes, methods, and forms along the way. This section explores how makers develop skills and techniques that turn material challenges into opportunities for innovation. A restored Hong Kong neon sign for Very Good Tailor (1963) will be on display in the museum for the first time alongside rarely seen original sketches of neon designs. Võ Trọng Nghĩa Architects’ study model of Wind and Water Café (wNw Café) (2006) showcases the versatility of bamboo as a fast-growing, sustainable material, whilst Barbara Sansoni’s sketches and colourful weavings depicting landscapes in Sri Lanka show the versatility of community handweaving practices.
The Hand and the Machine examines how the development of computing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning revolutionised the making process. By offering new, hybrid working methods, these innovations prompt questions about what craft might look like in this context. Since the 1960s, a new generation of artists have transformed concepts into algorithms and have increasingly produced non-linear, interactive, or randomised compositions. Highlights include Machine Painting Series TCM#14 (1995) by Harold Cohen, the pioneer of early AI computer art; Reactive Books (Tap, Type, Write) (1998) by technologist, artist, and educator John Maeda; and the archives of the speculative NFT project Bloemenveiling (2019) by Anna Ridler and David Pfau.
Actions and Consequences traces how consumerism came to shape contemporary society by demanding mass production, synthetic materials and low-paid labour. This section features a series of posters employing poignant imagery, sleek designs and memorable slogans that alert us to this moral and ecological crisis. Facing this global challenge, some makers focus instead on community engagement and speculative projects that address socio-political issues. Some examples on display include models from the Home-for-All project, a community-led design initiative fortemporary shelters and gathering spaces after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, and a poignant message to later generations in the form of Ki Saigon’s Letters to the Future (2021), which reflects on single-use plastic waste and its long aftermath.