The Learning Zone

External Space’s current exhibition hosted by OCAD U’s Learning Zone is Byron Chan’s continuously looping video called 1997 which explores Hong Kong’s tenuous relationship with it’s past, present and future and the cumulative impact on this once culturally diverse territory.

 Originally captured on 8mm film on a ferry in Hong Kong in the 1960’s, 1997 is a re-contextualization of found material that explores that region’s cultural transition after being returned to it’s Chinese “homeland” following a century and a half of existing under British rule.

Adrienne Crossman

Chan manipulates the found footage using digital tools, to erase the visual record of the people from 1960s Hong Kong, while maintaining a point of reference by retaining the image of one family, as they observe the changes.

On until August 15th at the Learning Zone, 113 McCaul Street Level 1

Exhibition Essay