From the first Asia Pacific Triennial (APT) in 1993, collaboration has been a much debated aspect of this event at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG). A great deal of effort was initially invested by the Gallery in locating and engaging in curatorial, institutional or diplomatic partnerships that brought local knowledge and justified the (informed) selection of artists. Although the international pairing of curatorial colleagues was subsequently discontinued, the Gallery has maintained its reflexive approach to exhibition making, employing its established and extensive networks and prolonged research in the areas of art, and more recently film and music, across Asia and the Pacific. The inclusion of the Long March Project in APT5 marked the continuation of a cooperative programming ethos, and the new inclusion of North Korean, Tibetan and west Asian artists, as well as filmmakers from the Indian subcontinent and the Middle East, indicate the expansive reach of the curators of the 6th Triennial.
Regardless of his proviso that an ‘event of this scale will naturally strain at the bonds of any overarching themes’, director Tony Ellwood could confidently state that the 6th Triennial had at its core ‘a long-held interest in collaboration, interconnectivity and cross-disciplinary practice’.1 Bearing in mind the complexities and range of possibilities—from mutuality to rudimentary exchange—that constitute the realities of cooperative alliances, where were collaboration and interconnectivity to be found in this event, and what might these actions contribute now to the ongoing transformation of the APT?
Suhanya Raffel’s pertinent reminder that the APT is a team effort distinguishes QAG’s organisational approach from the generally singular curatorial voice directing contemporary international biennales and triennials today.2 Within the large scale APT6, three discrete elements, ‘The... The rest of this article is available to subscribers of Eyeline