From the outset, this fifth ARX project has been an ambitious and adventurous undertaking, moving what had been an Australian-only based event to one that has straddled three countries. Operating from a partnership established with major institutions in Singapore and Hong Kong, ARX5 sought to interrogate the notion of cultural and artistic exchange within a model that embraces the region's complex and changing dynamic.

Without question, the Perth residency, sponsored by IFAC (Australia), continued to elevate the issues and complexities of cross-cultural activity more broadly than any previous ARX event has been able to achieve. Some of the key issues which emerged in the Perth residency included:

• Cultural sensitivity - what does this mean, now does it impact on artistic freedom and when does it spill over into the realm of censorship
• The Asian financial crisis and the accompanying turmoil which has prompted repercussive shifts in government attitudes to individual and institutional freedoms
• The questioning of language, societal values and cultural assumptions by the participants as they confront difference in all its manifestations.

Leung, Wong, Wong - Performance Opening Night, PICA

Whilst these issues have been pertinent to this project, they are issues that affect all artists and curators working in the field of contemporary art in the region. Exhibitions in major gallerys, publications and forums engaged national and international artists in ongoing cultural transactions. The inclusion of tertiary art students in the project was wonderfully rewarding, giving visiting artists immediate access to a strange city and enabling students to be privy to a professional practice which continues to flourish across generations, cultures and physical distance.

The "Billboard Campaign" used images from the fine arts students to promote the international exchange, and the exhibition opening at the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) was a celebratory and uplifting affair. Australian artists Joan Grounds and Jane Finlay created a site-specific installation exibited in both Weld Square and PICA, teaching and learning packages were distributred to fifty secondary schools.

Further information is available from the ARX5 website, or by email.