In a metropolis the place the ocean is rarely far-off, the Hong Kong artist Chan Wai Lap has turn out to be fascinated not with the open water however with the much more regulated world of the general public swimming pool. In drawings and installations, Chan focuses on the visible order of those areas from tiled surfaces and lane markings to the refined guidelines that form behaviour inside them.
That fascination surfaces in a number of initiatives showing round Artwork Basel Hong Kong this week. For a UBS fee, Chan is presenting Mimimomo Pool (2026), a playful jacuzzi-like seating set up. In the meantime, his exhibition Jeremy’s Bathhouse at Oi!—an arts and heritage advanced in North Level—imagines a bathhouse setting crammed with ceramic objects and refined organic references.
Chan spoke to The Artwork Newspaper about studying to swim as an grownup, watching the quiet choreography of public swimming pools—and the way these on a regular basis areas are structured by tacit guidelines and routines. Chan’s observe spans drawing, portray, set up and artist books; he graduated from Birmingham Metropolis College in 2011.
Chan Wai Lap turned serious about swimming swimming pools as social areas after taking over the exercise as an grownup Courtesy of the artist
The Artwork Newspaper: You began swimming comparatively late in life—what prompted you to show your self?
Chan Wai Lap: It was a type of escape. After ending a sequence of labor on faculties and feeling caught, I wished to get out of the studio. I watched some YouTube movies on swimming, and eavesdropped on swim coaches.
Within the morning there have been perhaps ten individuals within the pool, and no one actually cared whether or not I knew methods to swim or not. It was a really low-pressure state of affairs. After a summer time of selecting up the fundamentals, I began noticing the area and construction of swimming swimming pools.
What patterns or behaviours stood out?
Effectively, within the pool, your thoughts loosens up. You don’t have your cellphone with you to distract you. The smallest particulars begin catching your consideration, resulting in all types of associations, from the banal to the weird. Swimming swimming pools can really feel like a society in miniature—totally different rhythms and generations showing at varied factors within the day, from after-work swimmers in workplace districts to households and youngsters in residential ones. But swimming pools are additionally a really managed setting, not like the ocean.
Certainly one of your works, Chromatic Uniforms, is being introduced on the Centre for Heritage, Arts and Textile (CHAT) sales space at Artwork Basel Hong Kong, revisiting your earlier work on faculties and uniforms. How does that hook up with your more moderen curiosity in swimming swimming pools and bathhouses?
Lots of my works beforehand targeted on faculties: uniforms, report playing cards and institutional types. Faculties function by way of standardisation and bureaucratic constructions, as do swimming swimming pools, in their very own method.
These guidelines form how individuals behave as soon as they enter that setting. Even visible parts just like the tiles turn out to be a part of that construction, virtually like how desks and chairs construction a classroom.
In my drawings, the swimming pools are often empty. However in a method the viewer is the swimmer.
In the end, I’m within the guidelines across the physique. What is suitable in a swimming pool isn’t fairly acceptable on the road
Bathhouses and swimming swimming pools additionally include their very own codes of behaviour.
Proper. In the end, I’m within the guidelines across the physique. What is suitable in a swimming pool—for everybody to strip to their bathers—isn’t fairly acceptable on the road. How does the presence of water all of a sudden make carrying solely swimming trunks acceptable? For the CHAT venture, I collected uniforms from totally different Hong Kong faculties and organized them by color—from purple to orange, yellow, inexperienced, blue and purple, one thing like a listing for a college uniform firm. The kinds are literally fairly totally different, however they type a type of system.
You might be additionally presenting a jacuzzi-like set up, Mimimomo Pool (2026), within the UBS Artwork Studio at Artwork Basel Hong Kong, commissioned by the UBS Artwork Assortment. How did that concept come about?
It started with the concept of exhaustion in artwork gala’s. I did dream of an actual jacuzzi however, for 5 days, that was out of the query even when it could have been very pleasurable.
The title comes from the Cantonese expression mi1 mi1 mo1 mo1, which describes appearing or being gradual, dawdling or fussing about.
There are 12 seats, with vibrant pool umbrellas, so that you may find yourself subsequent to somebody you’ve by no means met earlier than—12 individuals introduced collectively by likelihood.
It’s a bit like swimming. Whenever you’re in a pool you usually don’t know the individuals round you. Typically it’s barely awkward—you have a look at them, they have a look at you. Typically you discuss, generally you don’t.
What really occurs is as much as the individuals. That’s one of the vital fascinating issues about public installations for me—seeing how individuals use them and what sorts of conversations emerge.
Chan Wai Lap’s recreated bathhouse on the Oi! arts area Picture: Tai Ngai Lung
Your exhibition at Oi!, Jeremy’s Bathhouse, turns to the concept of the bathhouse itself—an area traditionally related to hygiene, ritual and, often, likelihood encounters. There’s additionally a narrative of a somewhat lonely snail.
The title of the exhibition refers to a organic oddity. There’s a species of snail whose shell usually turns to the suitable, however somebody found one known as “Jeremy”, whose shell turned to the left. A genetic mutation, scientists stated. The factor is, a left-coiling snail has to search out one other left-coiling snail with a view to mate—however solely about one in 40,000 snails has that orientation.
I really began noticing snails rather more after transferring my studio to Fo Tan. I’d go working close by and, after the rain, all these snails would seem, and I must dodge them. I like the concept of this animal being gradual, fragile and sometimes hidden—it’s a metaphor for sure individuals or personalities.
The exhibition imagines a bathhouse setting, borrowing lots of its parts from bathhouse cultures all over the world—tiles, cleaning soap, seating, washing areas. I labored with craftsmen in Jingdezhen to provide a few of the ceramic cleaning soap as a result of I wished the supplies to really feel bodily and barely imperfect. However the area will not be full with out individuals. A bathhouse solely turns into significant when our bodies enter it—when individuals sit, transfer or just spend time there.
I visited Naoshima Bathtub “I” (“I Love YU”, 2009) [an art installation that doubles as a public bath], created by the Japanese artist Shinro Ohtake. I assumed it could largely be vacationers, as a result of the realm attracts guests—I used to be a vacationer, too. However I noticed that native residents had been really utilizing it. At that time, I felt the work was actually profitable.
Would you ever wish to construct an actual swimming pool or bathhouse?
Undoubtedly, no query. An exhibition, you’ll go as soon as, perhaps twice. A swimming pool or bathhouse is someplace you may go usually, two or thrice every week even. In that sense, the paintings has quietly entered on a regular basis life.
For these visiting Hong Kong throughout artwork week, which public pool would you suggest?
Lei Cheng Uk Swimming Pool is sort of unusual: it sits beneath a flyover. I generally think about if a automotive crashed above, it would fall straight into the pool—which feels somewhat terrifying, but additionally fascinating. It’s tucked away in a quiet nook of the town.
The Kowloon Park pool is fascinating as a result of it sits contained in the park. Guests can look down and watch the swimmers very carefully—it virtually seems like being on show, like animals in a zoo [Kowloon Park does have animals, like the flamingos in the pond].
After which there’s Tai Wan Shan pool, the place for HK$17 you get an open view of Victoria Harbour whilst you swim.
• Chan Wai Lap: Mimimomo Pool, UBS Artwork Studio, Artwork Basel Hong Kong, till 29 March; Chan Wai Lap: Jeremy’s Bathhouse, Oi!, Hong Kong, till 20 August
