Will Design Art Duo Batten and Kamp Move Back to Hong Kong?

The story of how an exhibition opens to the public usually begins at the launch, where beverages are cold and accompanied by a tantalising array of nibbles. The excitement builds around how visitors will respond to what is being presented to them. 

But when a residency is involved – which as the name suggests, holds the promise of a space to work and sometimes to live – the narrative arc starts earlier, long before the studio doors are thrown open for the public to experience the results. In fact, residencies in and of themselves take many forms, last for different durations and prove invaluable as a space to go, and to grow, for those who are invited after a competitive selection process. This may include artists, curators, writers, and others – like the New Zealand-born, Paris- and previously Hong Kong-based design duo Alexandra Batten and Daniel Kamp, who just completed a residency at Current Plans in Wong Chuk Hang, where they recently opened their exhibition, Existential Hardware, which runs until August 1.

Unlike other studio setups, which can also be a live/work situation, residencies have a time stamp on them and are arranged to allow for different participants to circulate and take advantage of their offerings, which can in turn encourage new experiences and facilitate a means for residents to share and advance their practices. 

As far as regional residencies go, there are a wide range through which creatives can take part, including through various non-profits and even commercial galleries for whom the push to develop a regional arts ecosystem outweighs the perceived private interests of those providing them. 

Batten and Kamp, who have been working together in both a familial and professional partnership for over 16 years, consider all their work to be formed in relation to one another; thus, any authorship is equal between them. “Basically, it’s our relationship made public,” says Kamp. Suffice to say, the most important connection for the married couple is the one that they have with each other. This, in turn, nurtures others developed with collectors, collaborators, as well as audiences for their work.

This holds true after several visits to discuss their Current Plans residency, which lasts a total of three months – two in preparation, one for the exhibition. The capacity for residents to expand their practices can also be characterised through the site itself, given its history of serving as an experimental, multipurpose art space, first as Spring Workshop and now as Current Plans. Beyond residencies, the venue hosts a wide range of cultural programming and more recently, it opened a small reading area, carrying the spirit of convening shared experiences while building the cultural legacy of Hong Kong.  

In fact, it was clear during these visits that the space became a living think tank for Batten and Kamp to explore different facets of their partnership through conversation and mutual agreement. Eventually this manifests as physical objects with some to be placed on stage within a completed installation and for programmes during the exhibition.

Studio visit: Saturday 1 June 2025

On the first of two studio visits, it is Batten and Kamp themselves — uniformly wearing black ensembles and donning silver jewellery — who are initially eye catching. This neutral yet sleek aesthetic looks to have settled upon their works, too.

At first glance, some pieces appear finished while others are still in process. Replete with component parts of metal, stone, neon, glass and tech gear, the pieces are set on the concrete floor, hover from pedestals, dangle from high ceilings and shimmer from light streaming through large glass windows. Within this industrial setting, the couple share how their native New Zealand’s rich but short history as the last landmass known to be peopled (the indigenous Māori first arrived around the turn of the 14th century) is deeply embedded in their work. The duo also reference Joan Wiffen (1922–2009), the famed self-taught palaeontologist who discovered the first dinosaur fossils in New Zealand. It’s not a stretch, then, to glean from the studio that the smattering of stones that are a part of many pieces hint at Batten and Kamp’s own creative landscape waiting to be uncovered. 

The couple’s prior travels in Asia changed the trajectory of their lives and careers. This includes Naoshima, the eight square kilometre “art island” in Japan, which hosts a plethora of house museums and other art and architecture by the likes of Tadao Ando, Yayoi Kusama, Lee Ufan and James Turrell. There was also the first time Batten and Kamp ran a live/work studio in Hong Kong’s Kennedy Town district, from 2020 to 2023. Now living in France, since joining Carpenters Workshop Gallery, a contemporary design atelier in Paris, the Current Plans residency offers another pivot point, as they eye a possible Hong Kong return. 

On the other hand, explaining how their work travels, depends on several factors. Regardless, both previously sold and available works, such as “Bad Boy” and “Mean Girl” (both 2023) on loan from local collectors, and other works from storage can already be found in the room.  

The duo are finishing multiple projects elsewhere, too, such as their commission for pop stars and art collectors Rihanna and A$AP Rocky, which first registered as a suspect email to the couple’s Inbox. Another collector once purchased their chairs as a dining room set. They are indeed popular – but just don’t call their pieces “collectible design,” as they prefer people to use as much as admire their work. Even being seated on a mix of furniture left behind from past Current Plans exhibitions — a metal bench, as well as other more comfortable seating — to speak together, highlights the functional use of design and casual atmosphere of the space. 

For their part, Batten and Kamp will further connect viewers as potential sitters through their Current Plans exhibition, working with invited collaborators to show objects like tables, chairs, textiles and even electronic piano keyboards to form a direct connection to the human body, and by extension, the residency as a site for art instigating human interaction.

Studio visit: Saturday 21 June 2025

A few weeks later, there are more works completed, others having moved, recently arrived, or still being unpacked. Source images and notes are tacked up on one wall, like last time. It’s clear there has been a flurry of activity, but other activities have happened here, too. As a multipurpose space, Current Plans serves many people simultaneously, thus requiring a degree of self-sufficiency on the part of its residents.

But as Batten and Kamp grow increasingly focused on their task at hand — completing and installing an exhibition including some irreplaceable objects, works on loan, and newly made pieces to be sold — there’s more of a pressure cooker vibe this time around.

Still, the draw to having their work in Hong Kong is strong. Citing pragmatic motivations rather than any sentimental appeal, they say the residency has been influential in their thinking process. They originally moved to Paris to make their work available to their gallery there, but the growing number of pieces at Current Plans makes clear that they require access to materials at reasonable rates relative to the production-to-sales percentage. It has proven prohibitive working outside of this region, with its proximity to factories in mainland China. Plus, the logistics of moving from place to place is exhausting; the desire to be nearer to family is compelling; and being made to feel welcome (again) in Hong Kong is proving to be energising. 

This balancing act between serving public and private needs resonates fully in their most personal works. “Sex Tape” (2023) involves the duo recording an intimate interchange between them onto a USB stick, which is now permanently encased in a glass and stainless-steel coffee table. Alongside other repeated forms like roses and chains, these act as forms of self-identification within works which provide different ways for the public to identify them. Other interchanges also take place through the creative act of their collaborations with Henry Chu, Henry D’Ath, Lousy, and Orange Terry as sculptural, textile-based, and other mixed media works.

Exhibition visit: Saturday 28 June 2025

It’s opening day for the Existential Hardware exhibition. Batten and Kamp’s “Forever and Ever and Ever” (2025), a life-size mirror sculpture, already completed on the last visit, has been moved and is now centrally located in the main room as if rooted so the other pieces radiate from it. In fact, it’s perfectly situated and serves as a metaphor for the residency itself: defining a period of self-reflection from which these works — single editions, not prototypes — exist in relation to and reflect each other, including those by their collaborators. 

The first exhibition opening guests to arrive are privy to understanding Batten and Kamp as object and not image makers: a stark reminder to step outside of the Instagram frame and “go live” from the digital interior design sphere. Current Plans becomes the place to actually see how something was made, and to let those whose work relies on three dimensions, be able to explore materiality in real life.

The trademark rose and jewellery appear to invoke physical as well as metaphysical associations. In short, these objects act as clues to consciousness, both representing Batten and Kamp themselves, and extending to their work a kind of signature, or symbolic stand-in for them.

The duo has also said they endeavour to “convert dread to wonder” which stems from a sense of existential crisis in their work. Here, elemental and natural forms evoke beauty while contemplating mortality, hinting perhaps at this same approach used in horror as a movie genre, or times when Gothic principles were revived in art and architecture. In short, the Existential Hardware installation acts as a sculptural version of vanitas, or when still lives serve as reminders of a finite existence to motivate viewers to appreciate life more, by witnessing the result of a creative act.

Ultimately, for Batten and Kamp as with so many artists, there is a constant balance between finding the space, time, and resources to create their work. This is what residencies offer, a place to workshop ideas, have time to formulate thinking around one’s creativity, and to shape temporary communities in their wake, perhaps even to form a more permanent one in future.

Existential Hardware runs at Current Plans until August 1, 2025. Click here for more information.

Ingrid Pui Yee Chu (朱珮瑿) is a Chinese Canadian curator and writer based in Hong Kong who has founded several independent curatorial initiatives. Most recently, she served as Associate Curator leading the Artists’ Book Library and as a Curator for BOOKED: Hong Kong Art Book Fair at Tai Kwun Contemporary, and her writing is featured in publications worldwide.