Kwai Fung Salone is thrilled to present Human Silk — a group exhibition supported by the Consulate General of Italy and Italian Cultural Institute in Hong Kong, as the opening event of ITALIA on STAGE Autumn Festival Hong Kong. It presents three outstanding mid-career artists from Italy, Paola Angelini, Thomas Braida and Nebojša Despotović, all of whom received their education in the city of Venice and have developed their distinguished careers with various degrees of connection to the lagoon city, which inspired the title of the exhibition. From Venice to Hong Kong, China, such cross-continent dialogue connecting the East and West brings to mind Marco Polo and his famous voyage along the Silk Road, a well-travelled record of human histories, connections, civilizations, and cross-cultural exchanges. Approaching contemporaneity through history and heritage, all three artists manifest what we call Human Silk, an attempt to locate the complexity and fluidity of human relations and perception in the flux of time.

This exhibition is our first collaboration with guest curators, Aurora Fonda and Sandro Pignotti, who are both from Venice. With an anthropological overtone, this exhibition delves into the essence of human sensibility, human perception, human art and human treasures. Taking as a point of departure their shared roots in the tradition of twentieth-century European art and their parallel interest in reinterpreting its artistic heritage, this exhibition brings the three artists together for the first time to trace the legacy of Italian and European modernist paintings and offers a fresh look at their role in art history. 

Gallery address: 03-G07, G/F, Barrack Block, Tai Kwun, 10 Hollywood Road, Central