Disobedience and Contemporary Sinophone Art

In recent years, a multitude of protest actions and grassroots expressions are redefining Sinophone art for the global-contemporary sphere. From Ai Weiwei’s Cockroach (2020) exploring the 2019 Hong Kong protests, to Abby Chen’s curatorial concept and projects WOMEN (2012, 2021), to Brother Nut’s eco-critical performances, to Popo Fan’s queer artivism, such works open up discussions on environmental crisis and civil rights in and beyond China. Referring to post-diasporic practices of Sinitic language-speaking communities and their creative practices, Sinophone art is an emergent and fast-growing interdisciplinary concept that facilitates sustained attention to Hong Kong and Taiwan, among other embattled nation forms, as well as to creative makers who grapple with shifting notions of Chineseness in the past and present. Digital artefacts, including documentary film and photography, documentations of performance and socially-engaged art, Internet memes, videogames, and deep fakes constitute some of the key visual and material objects that we investigate. At once adversarial and socially engaged, such disobedient objects and imaginaries supply the mediums with which Sinophone creators communicate and navigate emergent transnational expressions in the present day. Taking the opportunity of CAA 2023, this panel welcomes both experienced and early-career researchers, art historians, and cultural activists to meet in New York and discuss paradigm-shifting concepts and practices in, though not limited to, Hong Kong, Taiwan and China. We seek to engage in scholarly explorations of uncharted territories for networking, collaboration, and future publication.