“We No Longer See the Stars”: Richard Streitmatter-Tran on the Surveillance State

“We No Longer See the Stars,” multimedia artist Richard Streitmatter-Tran’s second solo exhibition at de Sarthe Gallery in Hong Kong, expressed fears over the impacts of advanced technology on state surveillance and the control of information.

Installed at the gallery entrance, the diptych Constellations (2019) comprised an image of Hong Kong’s Bank of China building and a portrait of a young man. LED light strips trace the triangular shapes of the iconic skyscraper and the man’s facial pattern as it might be visualized by facial-recognition software. The juxtaposition of the two images draws similarities between the recognizable features of a building and of one’s face, pointing to the surveillance of individuals and their surroundings. This theme was echoed in Face Off (2015–19), a six-channel installation recalling a CCTV control station that captures the faces of gallerygoers.

A Black Hole (2019) and Between the North Star and a Black Hole (2020) explored the pursuit of information. The former installation of a black umbrella on a tilted metal stand evokes a satellite dish, while the latter work comprises a collection of books on philosophy, politics, and art displayed in clear, plastic, wall-mounted cases that viewers were invited to open. The books and the satellite respectively represent traditional and modern means of transmitting information, raising questions pertaining to the evaluation of knowledge and forms of information-gathering.

Throughout the main gallery space were eight freestanding portraits of young adults, defiantly returning the viewer’s gaze. Titled after the 1971 film about six adolescents’ futile attempts at saving a buffalo from slaughter, Streitmatter-Tran’s painting series Bless the Beasts and the Children (2019–20) counteracts the disturbing theme of state control by affirming the power of global youth resistance—symbolized by his imagined multi-ethnic subjects—in spite of overwhelming odds. This work resonates in Hong Kong, especially when read alongside the black umbrella in A Black Hole (2019)—the shade and the object have become signifiers of resistance in the city, seen in the 2014 Umbrella Movement and the ongoing protests triggered by the now-withdrawn extradition bill.

Streitmatter-Tran’s exhibition seemed to remind us that although sociopolitical problems may weigh heavily on our lives, there are reasons to hope and to see not just the darkness but also the beauty of the stars.