HONG KONG.- M+, the new museum of visual culture of the West Kowloon Cultural District, announces the acquisition of two works by Tiffany Chung from her series, the unwanted population, The Vietnam Exodus – Hong Kong chapter (1975-2000).

• HKSAR statistics on yearly arrivals and departures of V-refugees from 1975-1997, 2016. Acrylic, ink, and oil on vellum and paper, 79 x 100 cm (31 x 39 ½ in.

• flotsam and jetsam, 2015-2016. Watercolor, ink, acrylic, vinyl, plexiglass, video and text28 works on paper, 40 text pieces on plexiglass panels, videos and text on electronic tablets. Dimension of 28 paintings: 30 x 42 cm (11 ¾ x 16 ½ in.); dimensions of 40 text pieces variable; dimensions of tablets: 15 x 26 cm (6 x 10 ¼ in.) [painting Illustrations by Ho Hung, Le Nam Dy, Nguyen Van Du, Nguyen Kim To Lan]

These purchases were made possible by the Brown Family Annual Acquisition Fund.

Tiffany Chung was born in Vietnam and continues to live and work there. Her work was most recently featured in the Venice Biennale's curated exhibition, All the World’s Futures in the Arsenale. There, she showed an installation of 40 map-based drawings relating to the ongoing crisis in Syria. Her documentation of the Syrian conflict and refugee crisis parallels her ongoing investigation of the post-1975 mass exodus of refugees from Vietnam, of which she herself was a part.

Now in its third year, the Brown Family Annual Acquisition Fund was conceived in 2014 to facilitate acquisitions of contemporary art for the M+ collection over a ten-year period. Each year during Art Basel in Hong Kong, a work (or works) with a total price not exceeding HKD 500,000 is selected for the M+ collection.

The selection process is carried out by a jury committee consisting of M+ curators and two outside jurors. The 2016 jury committee comprised Tina Pang, Curator, Hong Kong Visual Culture, M+, with outside jurors Mami Kataoka, Chief Curator, Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, and Reto Thüring, Curator of Contemporary Art, Cleveland Museum of Art.

The cornerstone of the ambitious West Kowloon Cultural District Project, M+ is Hong Kong’s new museum for visual culture, encompassing 20th and 21st-century art, design and architecture, and moving image from Hong Kong, China, Asia, and beyond. In the run-up to the official opening of M+ in 2019, the museum has been consistently building its collection, which currently houses over 4,000 works, as well as presenting diverse public programmes and exhibitions. The Brown Family Annual Acquisition plays an integral role in the continued growth and development of the M+ collection.

Said Rosamond Brown, “I established the Brown Family Annual Acquisition Fund to support the M+ Museum's ambitions to build a world class collection for Hong Kong. I very much hope that others will be inspired by and follow my example. This year the jury selected a work with great historical significance, from a time that I lived through. Art Basel Hong Kong goes from strength to strength and I look forward to supporting M+ in their acquisitions next year.”

Doryun Chong, Acting Director of M+, added, “Tiffany Chung's, HKSAR statistics on yearly arrivals and departures of V-refugees from 1975-1997, and flotsam and jetsam, are powerfully affecting works that have grown out of the artist's long-term research with the history, geography, and lived experiences of former Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong, as well as a new generation of artists in Vietnam who have not been taught the painful past of their nation's history. It is an important topic that should be remembered, and Chung's approach handles it with grace, thoughtfulness, and commitment. Her works remind us how art can be a crucial document of, and witness to forgotten histories. We are honoured to have her works in the M+ Collection.”

Reto Thüring, Curator of Contemporary Art, Cleveland Museum of Art, said, “The quality of Tiffany Chung's work lies in the way it addresses issues of the past, but it is as impressive in the way it relates to current developments.”

“Tiffany Chung’s new research-based work 'The Vietnam Exodus' represents the important political and historical relationship between Southeast Asia and Hong Kong, while also echoing the recent humanitarian crisis in Europe,” said Mami Kataoka, Chief Curator, Mori Art Museum. “In inviting a group of young artists in Vietnam who have been less exposed to the history of their own country, the artist also plays a part in ensuring that their collective memory will be passed on.”

In 2015, the fund was used for the acquisition of the painting S. S. Rajputana leaving the port of Bombay – 29th August 1931 by the contemporary Indian artist Atul Dodiya.