Publication: “OUTCAST”

As a monograph of Hong Kong artist LEE Kai-chung’s research-based art project The Narrow Road to the Deep Sea (2019 to 2021), OUTCAST comprises historical and archival research, fieldwork, interviews, conversations, documentation of exhibitions and public projects, exhibition reviews, transcripts of sound installations and more.

The Narrow Road to the Deep Sea is the second of Lee’s ‘Displacement‘ hexalogy. The project begins with memories of the artist’s drawing class at his secondary school in the 1990s, revealing how the school was used as the Fourth Army Hospital during the Japanese occupation, and how Hong Kong became a place to accommodate wounded Japanese soldiers and to research approaches to cope with infectious diseases in Southeast Asia battlefield. After the fall of Hong Kong, in 1942, the Japanese governor attempted to half the population of Hong Kong in an attempt to reduce the cost of governance and daily consumption, as a result, many were forced to leave Hong Kong and seek refuge in Guangdong province. During this period, the Japanese South China Epidemic Prevention and Water Department (Unit 8604) carried out various vivisection tests and bacteriological experiments on the refugees.

This publication is supported by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council.

Publisher: HB Station Contemporary Art Research Center
Book Size: 155 × 210 × 18 mm
Pages: 196
Binding: Perfect binding
Printing: Offset printing
Publication Year: 2021
Language: Traditional Chinese, English
Edition: First Edition
Order: Please fill in the Google Form or email kaiclee13@gmail.com

From March 2022 onwards, all sales from this publication (without deducting any cost) will be donated to war relief.

PROJECTS

The Narrow Road to the Deep Sea (2019-20)

Lee Kai Chung performs artistic research about people and their affect dissolved in history and ideologies.

In his early years, Lee was inspired by the lack of proper governance over public records, then he develops his archival research methodology as his key artistic practice. Through research, social participation and engagement, Lee’s work resonates with historical narratives, which demonstrates that individual gesture as a transition between politics and art.

In 2017, Lee initiated a hexalogy of consecutive practice-led research projects under the theme of Displacement– based on the understanding of human migration and material flow in the shadow of the colonial matrix of power, the projects scrutinise the agency of Displacement, expand the perception of the notion to affective, anachronic, transgenerational and geopolitical aspects of human conditions entangled in Eurasian problematics.

The Mountains and the Phantoms research-based series decipher the political and (post)colonial dimension of the natural environment in East Asia, drawing attention to its presence, self-healing and disaster that could resolve or exacerbate the devastating effects of geopolitical power struggles. The series includes the following projects- Can’t Live Without (2017), For Whom the Bell Tolls (2017), The Cold Mountain (2022-) and The Longing Park (TBC).

Lee’s ongoing research project Archive of the People addresses the political standing of documents and archives in the social setting. In 2016, Lee established the collective ‘Archive of the People’, which serves as an extension of his personal research to collaborative projects, education and publications.

In collaboration with curator Shen Jun, Lee founded stepbackforward.art and The Phantom Archives in 2020 and 2022 respectively: the former is an online platform collecting artist archives, fragmented thoughts and artist methodology; the latter extends Lee’s Displacement series to a public domain, constituting an online archives that embraces public participation.

Lee was awarded Honourable Mention in Sharjah Biennial 15 and Taoyuan International Art Award respectively in 2023; The Robert Gardner Fellowship in Photography from Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology of Harvard University in 2022, he received Altius Fellowship from Asian Cultural Council in 2020 and the annual Award for Young Artist (Visual Arts) from Hong Kong Arts Development Council in 2018.

Keywords: Displacement, Affect, Research-based practice, Archives

e: kaiclee13@gmail.com