RE:looking, 2002-2003

Video installation
30'' 40'

Collection of Singapore Art Museum

In the video installation work, Re: Looking (2002), Hoy Cheong blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction through presenting a documentary program about the influence of the Kingdom of Malaysia’s influence on postcolonial Austria. Broadcast through a fictional TV station name Malaysian Broadcasting Corporation, the video parodies the positioning of television documentaries as being an authoritative form of information. The show starts off in a serious manner and then creates some uncomfortable feelings regarding the two separate parts. Various fictive events, memories and history, create urgent contemporary problems, such as migration, racism, power relations and that of the monarchy. This work exploits the problem of the spread of information in the ‘cybernetic era’ –a fictive realm where there are no clear original sources and everything can be questioned.

About the artist

Hoy Cheong’s works originate from his academic knowledge. He studied literature at Brandeis University, and then a masters in education at Harvard University and then painting at the University of Massachusetts. His artworks cross various media. He often incorporates paintings, photography, video, installation and performance. As a citizen of Kuala Lumpur with a diverse ethnic background, he often presents issues about race, colonialism, history and marginalised communities in his artistic practice.


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