The Ghosts of Ho Tzu Nyen's 'Three Stories' Take Over Kiang Malingue
A three-part cinematic journey across the netherworld, earth and heaven.
Kiang Malingue is playing host to Three Stories: Monsters, Opium, Time, an exhibition of recent films and video installations by Singaporean artist and filmmaker Ho Tzu Nyen. Structured around trailokya, the three realms of spiritual existence, the show unfolds across the gallery’s multi-storied building, each dedicated to its own domain: the netherworld, earth and heaven.
Ho, known for his incisive reflections on temporality, presents three major works created over the last several years: “Night March of Hundred Monsters” (2021), O for Opium (2023) and the over 40-piece suite of Timepieces (2023). Together, they navigate the spectral histories of Japanese through yōkai (folkloric demons), the aesthetics of the opium trade and the elusive nature of time itself. Blurring myth and history, Three Stories doesn’t just recount the past, but pokes and prods at the forces that shape it.
The show culminates in Timepieces, a constellation of 43 customized screens peppered around the exhibition space. A testament to the paradox of time, Ho challenges Western-centric notions of temporal experiences, raising questions around how Southeast Asian perceptions of time – once fluid and unbound – can be reclaimed.
“In many ways, the challenge of this project was how the multiple can be composed, and how these different kinds of time can coexist without hierarchy and without collapsing into an empty pluralism,” the artist described in a recent statement.
While Ho takes center stage in Hong Kong, Kiang Malingue recently announced the opening of a second location in New York. The gallery is set to open in May and will be inaugurated by Hiroka Yamashita.
Three Stories is now on view through May 13, 2025.
Kiang Malingue
10 Sik On St,
Wan Chai, Hong Kong
