From February to July 2016 Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art (CFCCA) celebrates its 30 year anniversary in Manchester. The anniversary programme invites artists from CFCCA’s history who have gone on to achieve international recognition to return to Manchester to present new work. During April, Hong Kong artists Tsang Kin-Wah and Gordon Cheung who will both be presenting new work at the art centre.

Tsang Kin-Wah’s new installation, First trumpet in the new millennium, addresses one of the major world events of the 21st century to date; the terrorist attacks in New York on September 11th, 2001. Taking related footage found on YouTube to re-compose a new black and white video, different perspectives come together to depict a chaotic and impermanent world where creation and destruction take place at the same time.

The events of September 11th had a profound impact which resonated the world over, and Kin-Wah considers how the timing of the event heralded a ‘new era’; the dawning of the new millennium.

Tsang Kin-Wah held his first solo exhibition in the UK in 2008 with What are you looking at?; a provocative exhibition which used design and text to confront concerns with consumerism, sexual desire and transaction. He is known for mixing language with floral patterns usually installed as large scale wallpaper prints or immersive projected installations.

For the 30 Years of CFCCA programme Gordon will be exhibiting a collection of new works which examines the relationship between civilisation and conquest – in particular the social, moral and political climate surrounding China’s emergence as a 21st century global superpower, and the Western anxieties relating to this shifting global landscape. The exhibition presents appropriated Chinese propaganda posters that are glitched using a computer algorithm. The fragments of these posters are used like sand to represent the acceleration transition of time from era to era, mirrored by China’s changing ideologies.

Gordon Cheung said:

“When I came here I was immediately struck by the warmth of the people. In 2004 I did a residency at CFCCA, it came at a time that I was struggling to continue an artist. For me the residency was a lifeline and was also a creative catalyst where I was able to develop breakthroughs in mu work. It is great to return to the centre and support their 30 year anniversary celebrations with an exhibition of new work.”