Demystifying the Empress Dowager
For her upcoming show in Hong Kong, New York-based artist dominique Fung turns to the unlikely figure of empress dowager Cixi to investigate how a woman's image is shaped by perception, legacy and historical bias. Mariella Radaelli reports.
Fung aims not to reconstruct Cixi's world but to engage with its interpretations, omissions, and myths. Neither would she like to tell viewers what to take away from the show. She sees her artworks as open-ended, capable of carrying "multiple, sometimes conflicting, narratives".
Fung was born in Ottawa and now lives in New York City. She is particularly pleased to bring Beneath the Golden Canopy to Hong Kong — a layered site of shifting histories and identities. "The show reflects on how history is never truly fixed because it is constantly rewritten, reframed and debated. These themes resonate in Hong Kong, where East and West, tradition and modernity, are always in dialogue. I wanted my first exhibition here to reflect that complexity."
The Hong Kong show is also a homecoming for Fung, who has roots in the city. "Hong Kong was always a distant yet familiar presence growing up," she says. "I think a lot about this sense of inherited memory — about how places can shape us even when we are physically removed from them."
IF YOU GO
Beneath the Golden Canopy
by Dominique Fung
dates: March 24 to May 16
Venue: Massimo de Carlo galle no 10 hollywood Road, Central, Hong Kong
