THE BLACK STORE is art in disguise. Our works comments on the marketing and advertisement, with the tricks and strategy they use. We hope by doing so, audience will be more aware of such strategies and will think about it.

THE BLACK STORE was a New Media research project. Five students from Master of Arts in Visual Cultural Studies in The Chinese University of Hong Kong treat their course project with a little more than others do. They contacted Gallery Z in JCCAC last year, turning such school project into a multimedia performance art and exhibition piece. Opening a “store” in a gallery, wearing uniforms and turning into ‘salespersons’, hard-selling their over-priced ‘artworks’. We are not only doing academics, but a belief and criticism of the values.

We believe that even cents have their value; if some junk commercial goods can be sold with packaging, then we might use branding and packaging to make those seemingly valueless things grow. Our first opening was a great success, and so we did an encore some 20 days later. People liked our Facebook pages, and became our friends.

After our graduation, we went into different ways. We became a marketing coordinator in an international brand, a video editor in cable TV, a drama project coordinator, and local digital media analyst, laboratory officer in quality testing company. Yet our ambition remains. And we decided
to re-run The BLACK STORE, this time fortunately we have our venue sponsor- Red Elation Gallery. With a professional branding for arts, and a group of artists who share our beliefs, creating a series of artwork.

This is an experimental exhibition, THE BLACK STORE want to discuss how values are formed, and it must goes beyond branding. From worthless cents to arts; from a Master course study to real live marketing technique. We turn some local artists into a rising international artist by branding, using words and other information to guide our audience the way of seeing, while at the same time leaving space for thinking. We break the gap between arts and the public, and hoping
to audience to find their own ways of appreciating arts, and trust their eyes!