6.-27. May 2000

The artists, Chu Chu Yuaii, Sarawut Chutiwongpeti, Foo Aiwei, Jeremy Hiah, Lim Kok Boon, Tayeba Lipi, Mahbubur Rahman, Miho Shimizu and Woon Tien Wei come from Bangladesh, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and are presently living and working in Austria, Ireland, Japan, Singapore, and UK as surrogate Heimats.

Only Jeremy Hiah, Tayeba Lipi, Mahbubur Rahman, Miho Shimizu, and Woon Tien Wei from Bangladesh, Japan, and Singapore, will be doing a short term residence in the Galerie 68elf, Cologne.

The project explores the many facets of a complex globalisation in today's economies that neccesitates an indepth investigation, specifically examining the translation of cross-cultural information, and the negotiations and/or reconciliations in the eventual actualised encounters/experience of such translated information.

lt looks at how the individual interprets/translates cross-cultural information which then leads them to make the decision to leave their home country, temporarily or permanently, in search of improvement (?) of their current status/change.

It also invites the participating artists to examine the positions of displacement while in a foreign environnment and the different strategies individuals invent in order to negotiate their positions. The third facet explored is that of the actualisation of knowledge after the stage of realisation of each individual's projected hopes.

Jay Koh's curatorial interest is in further exploring cross-cultural issues as a progression from his earlier projects E.T. (Exchanging Thought) 1995/96 in Chlangmai/Thailand, The Other Critic 1997 in Cologne, The X/change 1999 in Beijing and Cologne.

When the show opens on 6th May the works are viewed as works in progress. Audiences are invited to discuss with the artists present about their investigations on the above issues and all the completed works will be shown on the 27th May (Finnisage) in the Galerie 68elf, Cologne.