Tanner Menard looked at the Cantocore project from a distance stating:

I have been reading about Cantocore for a number of days totally obsessed by the complexity of the concepts presented on its site http://cantocore.com/, but it was not until I read the following statement that I was really sold on the idea; ‘Cantocore is the reality of life versus the theory set forth by jurisdictions where people live.’ As an artists who’s personal world view leans towards ontological anarchy, this statement elevates Cantocore from a link on Jon Phillip’s website to the top of the bookmark list on my favorite web browser.

I then waxed poetic about it on my website stating:

When people ask me to explain what exactly Cantocore is, I often dance around the similarities between Guangzhou and San Francisco. Both are at the far extremes from the political centers of power in China and the United States respectively. I also usually talk about the lifestyle of lowered barriers of the 3 P’s: property, privacy, and prices. These combined increase one’s state, or feeling of, personal freedom. However, this concept of the reality of life versus the theory set forth explains exactly how I feel about Cantocore: Just do it! Don’t have a meeting. Don’t make a committee. Don’t whine. Just make your project wherever you are at with what resources you have. Get it off the ground and sort out the pieces as you go.

Please check out the full text of both Tanner’s post and my re-follow-up. Please consider adding your own thoughts as your own review out there on your site, or feel free to blog here or in the comments on this site. We are eager to hear what you think about Cantocore and the latest show on in San Francisco until April 18, Cantocore Free On Board.

Katie Farrell from Art Slant reviewed Cantocore FOB. The piece starts off by stating:

The most successful work in Cantocore: Free on Board not only investigates the nuanced layers of trade and culture between Guangzhou and San Francisco, but also incorporates translation/mis-translation, authenticity/reproduction, and the copy-of-a-copy-of-a-translation spirit.

Cantocore: Import/Export (2008) was originally curated for Ping Pong Space, a large warehouse space in Guangzhou, China. Curator Jon Phillips invited six San Francisco-based artists and six Guangzhou-based artists to participate [1]. This second, more intimate edition at Mission 17 includes a few scaled down pieces, or in some cases, omits original work by the artists’ choice or by size constraint.

The exhibition opens with Huang Xiaopeng’s What Does “Globalization” Means To You? a wall text piece that stretches the entire hallway. A billboard contained indoors, the piece is too big to digest while remaining still. The viewer must walk back and forth, tracing the text with his body instead of his eye. The result of translating “globalism” from English to Chinese to English is “thanks to the expansion of the empire economic and culture exchanges become possible to the maximum extent and previously isolated civilizations become linked”. A very appropriate opening for Cantocore.

Read the rest of the write-up here.

NOTE: Curation duties for this show go to Justin Hoover and Lu Fang as well.