The Asia Triennial Manchester kicks off a month of art and film this November

The sixth edition of Asia Triennial Manchester (ATM6) launches this November, showcasing a diverse body of works by more than 30 international artists and collectives.

Hosted by Manchester School of Art at Manchester Metropolitan University, the curatorial framework of the multi-venue triennial is ‘transvaluation’. To transvalue means to transgress the logic of value and the systemic structures it legitimises.

The triennial brings together a range of works which are linked by their creation of new ways to think about value, extending beyond economic value, efficiency and utility to establish new conceptions of social, sexual, ecological, indigenous and decolonial relations.

Curated by Hongjohn Lin, Henk Slager, Miya Yoshida, Kalen Lee, and Yusaku Imamura, the triennial also seeks to question and complicate the symbolic, cultural, political and poetic values associated with Asia today.

Works will be displayed across  The Holden Gallery, Manchester School of Art; The School of Digital Arts’ (SODA) Modal Gallery; Grosvenor East’s main reception; the Link Gallery, and the Poetry Library – all located at Manchester Metropolitan University’s All Saints Campus on Manchester’s Oxford Road.

Beyond Manchester Metropolitan University’s exhibition spaces, ATM6 will also extend into the city, through partnerships with the Manchester Art Gallery, esea contemporary, and HOME.

Also part of the programme is a festival celebrating the work of groundbreaking filmmaker Tsai Ming-liang at HOME, which will include screenings and an in-conversation with the Director. A partner exhibition by Marcos Kueh at esea contemporary runs in parallel to the triennial, and includes the co-commissioning of a new work by the artist with esea contemporary, Manchester Metropolitan University, and the Centre for Heritage, Arts and Textile (CHAT), Hong Kong SAR.

At Manchester Art Gallery, Yu-Chen Wang presents a research-based artwork Sea Forest, 2023-25, exploring the ecological and symbolic significance of mangroves, reflecting on resilience, interdependence and renewal. The starting point for this project is a botanical specimen collected in Formosa (now known as Taiwan) in 1864 by Richard Oldham (1837 – 1864), a botanist born in Macclesfield, now known as Kew Garden’s last collector.

Ahead of ATM6, an international collective of doctoral students has formed Research Jam, providing a discursive and intergenerational platform, which will take over the arches at HOME from Mon 27 Oct – Fri 31 Oct. This week of events acts as a precursor to the triennial and a call to emergent artists, students and younger people in Manchester to explore the many themes, questions and contexts central to the triennial.

ATM was established in 2008 by Alnoor Mitha as Europe’s only contemporary art event dedicated to exhibiting and engaging with contemporary art from Asia and its diaspora.

The sixth edition of Asia Triennial Manchester runs from Tue 4 Nov – Thu 4 Dec. You can find more information about the programme here.