CHAT Hong Kong exhibition explores craft's role in cultural identity and ecological consciousness

The exhibition "Lining Revealed" at Hong Kong's Centre for Heritage Arts and Textile (CHAT) investigates how contemporary artists employ traditional craft methods to explore connections between personal memory, cultural identity, and ecological awareness. While craft has historically been distinguished from fine art due to its functional nature, the 1960s saw divergent approaches across regions. In Europe and the United States, fiber art developed as part of modernism, with Western artists appreciating traditional weaving's geometric patterns for their alignment with Bauhaus principles of form, line, and composition. Meanwhile, across Asia during the same postcolonial nation-building era, artists in Southeast and Central Asia turned to Indigenous practices like batik, weaving, and embroidery—often categorized as folk art—to rebuild cultural narratives and identities grounded in local histories and communal knowledge. The exhibition examines how these age-old techniques are now being used to address contemporary fragmentation.