Schoeni Projects is pleased to co-present with THE SHOPHOUSE, ‘Door to Door’, a summer residency programme located in Hong Kong and London. The dual residency involves an exchange of artistic ideas, creating dialogue between participating artists Szelit Cheung and Olga Grotova, and their audience. We are pleased to present an exhibition of new and unique works created by the artists during their artists-in-residence at MLS Artist Residency MLSAR in London at Cromwell Place.
Szelit Cheung’s works engage with the architectural compositions of MLSAR which is housed in an 1850s Victorian townhouse in London. With his delicate and meticulous observation of variations in light across structural compositions and space, he created the respective Door series and House series. Cheung's practice involves using contrast in colours and minimal forms to portray the fleeting moment of light and shadow within an ethereal space, exploring the transitional period of happenings in the parallel of presence and emptiness.
Russian-born British artist, Olga Grotova, is known for her unique approach using light-sensitive objects found in nature and earth pigments as a medium of drawing. For the 'Door to Door' residency programme, her works employ the materials associated with her respective cultural inheritances and encounters in Hong Kong and London. Using photographic emulsion, typhoon-torn tree debris, plants, crushed shells, mineral pigments and soil gradually evolve in her creations through exposure time and the transitive nature of light. The entire process unfolds traces of interwoven materials in layers. The transparency and texture within the work invoke the feeling of untraceable memories from the past, inviting individuals to embark on a personal journey to explore these lost fragments. Grotova's artistic practice is a testament to her ability to capture the ephemeral and elusive nature of memory and history.
About the artists
Szelit Cheung is a Hong Kong-based artist who engages in a cross-disciplinary practice including painting, drawing, photography, sculpture and installation. His current practice resembles the essence of void and explores the connection between presence and emptiness by utilising simple forms, light and colours as a means to echo and amplify the intangible yet powerful feelings and expressions.
After graduating from The Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University (RMIT) in 2012, he works solely as an artist and continues pursuing his passion for art. His work has been widely exhibited in different places, including America, France, Japan, Taiwan, China, and Hong Kong. He has held solo exhibitions in Touch Gallery (Hong Kong, 2022), Rossi & Rossi Gallery, (Hong Kong, 2021) and Galerie Ora-Ora (Hong Kong, 2020). Group exhibitions include Wind H Art Center (798 Art Zone, Beijing, China, 2023), Tokyo Gallery + BTAP (Tokyo, Japan, 2021), One Thousand Museum (Miami, 2019), Pearl Lam Galleries Hong Kong SOHO (Hong Kong, 2017) and Crane Gallery (Taiwan, 2015).
Find out more about this artist via @szelit_cheung / www.sze-lit.com
Olga Grotova is a Russian-born British artist and poet living and working in London. Her practice involves collecting and mapping stories of Soviet and Eastern-European women that have been erased from established historical narratives. Grotova undertakes research journeys to discover the lost histories of communities and families from former Soviet states in order to dispel male-dominated and power-centric ‘official’ narratives. Her practice is a feminist interruption of the Russian political narrative plagued by extraction, patriarchy, and imperialism. The erased female narratives create fractures and inconsistencies in the official history and undermine the regime built on terror, misogyny and militarisation. By discovering erased or misunderstood female histories and questioning the homogenised state-backed narrative, she opens up the potential for larger explorations of resistance to global ecological catastrophe, colonisation and totalitarianism.
Grotova graduated from the Royal College of Art MA in Painting (2016) and participated in residency programmes with Schoeni Projects and THE SHOPHOUSE (2023), Studio Voltaire (2023), CAD+SR (2022, facilitated by Rirkrit Tiravanija and Pelin Tan), Atelier 17 Paris (2022), Wysing Syllabus VI (2020-2021) and Praksis (2019) amongst others. Selected exhibitions and performances include Studio Voltaire (London, 2023), KADIST (Paris, 2023), Les Rencontres d’Arles (Arles, 2022), Garage Museum of Contemporary Art (Moscow, 2021), Centrala (Birmingham, 2019), Oslo Kunstforening (Oslo, 2019), Mimosa House (London, 2018), Guest Projects (London, 2012) and Hayward Gallery (London, 2012).
Find out more about this artist via @olgagrotova / www.olgagrotova.com
