The first time I saw this exhibition was during the Third Asia Pacific Triennial in Brisbane last September, when all things Asian and Australian in art were vying for attention during the frenetic few days of the Symposium. As I was unable to absorb much during that time, I am glad of a chance for this second viewing in Perth.

There are several aspects of this exhibition that interest me, one of the main ones being the inclusion of a significant proportion of Asian-Australian artists (6 in all), with the exclusion of Aboriginal artists. This seemed an oversight on the part of the curatorial body, as I initially understood the exhibition to be a comprehensive one of contemporary art in Australia, until I read the catalogue which put the show in perspective as one of "a story of East and West, the presence of Asia in Australia and of Australia in Asia…seen as a defining part of the question of who we are and what we can be".

In her introduction to the catalogue, Dr Gene Sherman, Director of Sherman Galleries in Sydney which auspiced the show, states that: "The Rose Crossing, as an exhibition, represents a multiplicity of voices and visions. It seeks to bear visual witness to the cultural richness of thirteen significant living Australian artists’ responses to the literary work of the same name by Nicholas Jose. The artists’ backgrounds echo, quite deliberately, the philosophical issues underpinning this contemporary tale set in the seventeenth century. Two shipwrecked vessels and their human cargo meet, greet, merge and converge on an unnamed island, symbolic of the intermediary zone between cultures. East and West quite literally collide via the passionate embrace of two young people and the curiosity of two old men."

The work on the walls, (this is an exhibition of mainly two dimension works) on the whole, reflect the artists’ own response to their diasporic state as migrants in Australia or conversely as Australians with an Asian connection. John Clark, in his essay, ‘Crossings’  categorises the artists and their work into two groupings: "those who work with memories of actual landscape, and those with memories of places defined culturally or in terms of art discourses. Collectively, they tell us that we may never escape from where we are, but sometimes we can investigate where that place is and re-emplace it within another set of references". Thus Hossein Valamanesh, with his burnt Persian carpet in Longing Belonging, hints at the impossibility of reclaiming a life left behind, while at the same time, a glimpse of the landscape through the burnt hole in the carpet suggests a new perspective of a life of displacement.

The exhibition makes more than a single reference to displacement. Savanhdary Vongpoothorn’s pierced canvas, Weaving Trees, is characteristic of her technique of perforating her surfaces in configurations that were originally based on textile patterns from her native Laos. Through this she constantly references the part of her life that is not Australian, bringing into focus the diversity of our cultural life. The collaboration between Tim Johnson and My Le Thi, Nailing Painting, superimposes My Le Thi’s body imprint onto a canvas by Johnson with its tiny figurations of stereotypical Asian content on a textured ground. My Le Thi, as a migrant from Vietnam makes her personalised mark on a work that is born of an Anglo-Australian imagination. John Wolsley’s detailed drawings, Tracing the Wallace Line, gives, on the other hand a more conservative view of Australia’s connection with Asia, with maps underpinning drawings of vegetation of the region. His engagement seems detached, more as an observer of the region than as a participant. This atmosphere of detachment very much reflects Felicia Kan’s photographs of land and sky-scapes. Kan’s work subtly reveals her identity as an Asian Australian through the titles, but not necessarily the imagery. Both pieces are from the series Different Fields, Different Skies.

On the whole I felt sombre at the exhibition. Drifting from one piece of work to the next, I couldn’t help feeling a little lost as I tried to engage with the work, finding the point of contact of my own Asian background engulfed by the atmosphere of benevolent multiculturalism at the opening. Here is an anecdote to end. As I was standing next to the Guan Wei triptychs, Neo Genesis No.1  & 3, a gentleman nearby asked if I understood the meaning of the mythology behind the work. I couldn’t help wondering if he assumed that I knew all about it because I looked Asian, bringing back memories of my early years in Australia about 30 years ago when I was asked if I was related to everyone Asian-looking on the television.