Samson Young: Songs for Disaster Relief World Tour

Venue: M+ Pavilion

February 9–May 6, 2018
Co-presented by M+ and Hong Kong Arts Development Council

M+ at the West Kowloon Cultural District and Hong Kong Arts Development Council (HKADC) are pleased to announce Samson Young: Songs for Disaster Relief World Tour, a new presentation following Hong Kong’s successful participation in the 57th Venice Biennale. The first show of 2018 and the sixth at the M+ Pavilion—will open to the public from February 9 until May 6, 2018, and mark the first stop of this exhibition’s "world tour."

After an acclaimed showing in Venice, the exhibition returns to Hong Kong along with specially commissioned pieces through which the artist aims to offer a more holistic experience in a contextualized setting to audiences. Samson Young: Songs for Disaster Relief World Tour can be seen as a musical album, unfolding within the spaces of the M+ Pavilion and transforming into a network of several interconnected rooms. Through creative re-interpretation and purposeful misreading of some of the most recognizable charity tunes such as "Do They Know It’s Christmas?" (1984) and "We Are the World" (1985), as well as one of Hong Kong’s most iconic charity songs—the Cantonese version of "Bridge Over Troubled Water" (1991), Young has produced a unique audio-visual experience merging objects, performances, and sound installations.

Curated by M+ Guest Curator Ying Kwok, with M+ Deputy Director and Chief Curator Doryun Chong as Consulting Curator, the exhibition is accompanied by a series of talks, guided tours, and live performances. Access services can be arranged in advance.

Samson Young (b.1979, Hong Kong) is an artist and composer based in Hong Kong. Young's diverse practice draws from the avant-garde compositional traditions of aleatoric music, musique concrète, and graphic notation. Behind each project is an extensive process of research, involving a mapping of the process through a series of "sound sketches" and audio recordings. His drawing, radio broadcast, performance and composition touch upon the recurring topics of conflict, war, and political frontiers.

Young was the inaugural winner of the BMW Art Journey Award at the Art Basel Hong Kong 2015. His recent solo projects include Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Japan (2015); Team Gallery, New York (2015); Para Site, Hong Kong (2016); Experimenter, India (2016); Kunsthalle Düsseldorf, Germany (2016).