How artists and museums can embrace globalism

On Friday afternoon, Asia Society New York hosted a half-day symposium dedicated to a subject that has become a frequent topic of conversation in the art world: How can artists and museums deal with increasing interconnectivity?

At the center of the discussion was the contemporary Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang, the subject of the Shanshan Xia documentary What About the Art? that was screened before Friday’s discussion. The film explores aspects of the planning and the curatorial mission of Cai’s exhibition of the same name at the Doha Museum of Art in Qatar and features Cai conversing with 30 international artists and specialists on questions surrounding methodology and creativity. These conversations represent an effort to explore each artist’s singular contributions to contemporary art. Throughout the film, Cai brings our attention back to the creative and intellectual value of a work of art, as opposed to its capital or market value.

In a keynote address following the screening, the American artist, critic, and curator Robert Storr said that Cai’s work “pressures the viewer to think” about social and environmental issues in a global context. In his 2016 gun powder drawing on paper White Tone, for example, Cai depicts dozens of different animal species drinking from the same pond — thus breaking down barriers and stressing the importance of coexistence. Issuing a reminder that art is global and should bring people together, Storr relayed a quote made famous during the civil strife in Los Angeles in the 1990s: "If we can't get along, we perish."

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