Small room downstairs is an exhibition from Scotty So. Showcasing some of the works from his appearance at the NGV Triennial, this exhibition includes his China Masks along with a series of hologram videos. Scotty So’s exhibition presents a collection porcelain facemasks and photographic prints that reflect the artists’ experience of the COVID-19 pandemic in Melbourne, and the 2003 SARs crisis in Hong Kong. So draws attention to the fact that masks have become a symbol of fear and led to racial assaults on the Asian community, which adopted mask-wearing at the beginning of the pandemic. Through this project, So plays with the similarity in the colours of surgical and N95 masks via jade green celadon hues and other Chinese porcelain traditions. Making porcelain ‘china’ masks, the artist finds beauty and irony in the fragile material when it’s used as safety gear.

Alongside with the masks series, Small room downstairs also includes 3 hologram videos multimedia work. In the hologram videos series, As she …, So explores the fetishism of Oriental women in Sci-fi movie and advertising. He recorded himself performing as his drag persona Scarlett So Hung Son, transferring the videos onto the hologram advertising device, creating the ghostly moving image of Scarlett that entertains the audience forever.