Much is often said about diversifying Macau’s economy and developing the creative arts, but really promoting the local art scene successfully has proven a challenge so far, despite some very good efforts and isolated success stories. Rather than promoting Macau art to the wider world, the organizers of locally based art fair, ART MO have a different strategy: bring the art world to Macau by putting on a truly serious international art fair.
Just two years since its first fair, ART MO has successfully established itself as one of the most significant annual art events in Macau. With great ambition and vision, ART MO Operations Director Ho Kin U and his team are determined to make ART MO an effective platform for artists, curators and art collectors in Asia, as well to incorporate arts into Macau’s society and economy.
CLOSER speaks with the ART MO team about their strategy and takes a look at how the regional visual art market is developing simultaneously.
Despite all that has been said and done to support the development of the local arts and creative industries, the internationalization of Macau’s art market and industry is still far from accomplished. Some insist on the traditional way – organizing art events in Macau that cater mainly, if not only, to local artists, hoping that with enough exposure, they can eventually elevate themselves to the international level.
Nevertheless, ART MO Operations Director Ho Kin U believes that this approach is not effective enough. For Ho, the priority should be to transform Macau into an international platform of arts. It is then that local artists will be able to show off their talent to the world, as artists, collectors and curators from Asia and all over the globe converge on the city.
Making its debut in 2013, ART MO has aims to utilize Macau’s multi-cultural background and geographic location, as well as its booming entertainment and tourism industry, to establish an Asian art exchange platform in the city.
The art fair has successfully attracted numerous artists, art institutions and organizations to take part in the event, with some of the big names appearing including Joana Vasconcelos from Portugal, Chinese contemporary fashion photographer Chen Man, Gallery SUN Contemporary from Korea and Pifo Gallery from Beijing. In this year’s ART MO that will take place between December 4 to 7 at Venetian Macau, they are determined to enhance the program of the art fair and bring it one step closer to its goal.
“I think Macau has the characteristics to become a platform for arts,” Ho tells CLOSER. “For example, it has the best hotels, a huge amount of tourists and visitors, a historical background and excellent exhibition venues such as that at The Venetian. Therefore, I have decided to try to see if I can establish in Macau a small-scale Asian art platform.”
Ho agrees that an attractive art fair has to be unique and should have its own personality and characteristics, determined by the cultural and economic background of the country or city where it is located.
“It’s pointless to repeat the same thing over and over again in different cities and countries.”
This has motivated him to create a new combination of elements that nobody has put together before.
An art platform for Asia
ART MO has a very clear vision, which is to build “an international petite fair in Macau”. In order to achieve an international status, Ho notes that over 99 percent of the art pieces in ART MO have not been from Macau. Nonetheless, the focus is on Asia, with artists and galleries participating all from all over the region.
“Someone asked me before why there were so few Macau artists involved in the second ART MO. It is very simple: we don’t want international collectors to think that ART MO is a little local fair. We want to position ourselves as an international fair. If half of the artists shown in ART MO are local artists, the collectors are not going to come. We need to have the big name galleries from Asia in order to attract the big collectors,” says Ho.
He believes that once ART MO is established as an international platform in Macau, local artists will no longer need to struggle to join the fairs elsewhere. Rather, they can hold their exhibitions in Macau because ART MO will have already drawn collectors from the world right to their doorstep.
“It is not easy for Macau artists to get their names out there, but once ART MO is established, we can invite hundreds of art media and collectors to Macau each year. Artists here can then acquire international exposure.”
Connecting art with the economy
Despite ART MO’s success and the fact that around MOP20 million has already been invested into the project, Ho says that it is still far from what they want the art event to achieve in terms of local involvement and international recognition. His goal is to incorporate ART MO into the local economy and society so that Macau as a whole can benefited from the event. “Macau’s economic model is based on the casino and tourism industry. Therefore, we have to integrate with the casino, tourism and hospitality industry. This is very important.”
Ho reveals that at ART MO 2015, they are going to create an “ART MO Tour”. The organizer plans to produce an ART MO Map that will be distributed to visitors and tourists, allowing them to follow the map and visit local art galleries, institutions and organizations, as well as see different exhibitions taking place around Macau in public and private venues such as the Macau Museum of Art and the Ox Warehouse.
“We want to turn ART MO into something that can attract people to Macau. It would be impossible to make people come to Macau for just a little fair. We need something more, which is what the ART MO Tour will offer,” explains Ho. “Instead of merely one exhibition, people are going to see maybe 20 exhibitions [taking place in Macau]. They can then stay here for some shopping and watch some performances. Hopefully we can even turn this into a little package in the long term through establishing alliances with hotels and airlines.”
In an era where “diversifying the local economy” sounds more like a slogan than a genuine objective, Ho’s plan seems to be one of the very few that truly aims to deliver.
Education is key
Another element that Ho wants to see in ART MO 2015 is an education program that allows high school and university students be involved in ART MO.
“We want students to come to see ART MO every year like a field trip and we are going to prepare an introduction for their teachers before the official opening of ART MO each year so that teachers can tell their students what is going to happen at the exhibition.”
The fair director wants ART MO to be more than a commercial event, but one that is respected by the academic world.
“We don’t want to turn ART MO into a buying tour for collectors. We want it to be a cultural tour. Therefore, the exhibition has to also be academic somehow.”
As a result, ART MO will organize the ART MO Forum that will involve heavyweight policy makers from Macau and other countries and regions.
“We will invite speakers from all over Asia to be involved in the ART MO Forum that will last for three to four days. There will be talks and roundtables on different topics regarding arts, between collectors, private museum owners and policy makers from different cities in Asia, as well as artists, curators and non-profit art program operators.”
The ART MO team also plans to bring overseas exhibitions to Macau. Ho says that they have two principles when picking those exhibitions. The first one is that the exhibition has not taken place in Asia before, and the second one is that it can serve the purpose of fostering exchange between artists from the East and West.
“These kinds of exhibitions are important because they will put Macau on the world art map.”
He estimates that after another two to three years, ART MO will eventually be established as the Asian platform of arts in Macau.
One of the crucial members of the ART MO team this year is the team’s Strategic Marketing Advisor Nicola Covelli. Recently arrived in Macau, Nicola emphasizes the importance and benefits of promoting arts. “Art is a good starting point for a city to grow,” he says. However, instead of merely showing people art pieces, Covelli believes that it is more important for people to possess an awareness of arts through education. Though not in Macau for long, he also observes that there is not enough space for art exhibitions in the central areas. He hopes that the government can convert some of the publicly owned empty historical buildings into art space and galleries in the future.
