This text aims to give an overview of existing biennials in Southeast Asia. By adopting a national perspective, it describes the genesis, the continuation (or not) and the programmatic character of regional biennials. The text proposes that the idea of perennial exhibition can be traced to the 1970s, when the ASEAN started to promote regional events, in an attempt to create unicity through culture. As this project lost vitality, it was substituted for biennials in Southeast Asia and in the Asia-Pacific region. According to the reasons behind their genesis, some biennials that were established in Southeast Asia follow the biennale model while others follow the model of resistance biennales. This shows variety and regional independence toward the global world.

Is it possible to define an avant-garde for Southeast Asia? If so, what are its specific traits and how did it emerge? In this article, I propose that Southeast Asian artists have established an avant-garde that I term "Third Avant-garde". Works that I characterise as Third Avant-garde have, as their most striking feature, the presence of fragments of tradition. This presence of traditional fragments may be experienced as anachronic, because it provokes an oscillation between different temporalities: past and present, traditional and modern. The Third Avant-garde refers to practices which emerged most notably in the 1990s, although its roots date from the mid-1970s. 1 This was a time when notions of a "Third Space" were primal, indicating a possibility of residing in the interstices between two places, such as art and ethnography. My concept of the Third Avant-garde, however, does not indicate solely a negotiation between these two realms. Instead, the Third Avant-garde is proposed as a locus for contesting the taxonomical system that divides fine arts and culture. Among other things, the emergence of artistic practices of the kind that I term Third Avant-garde has also provoked western ethnographic museums to rebrand themselves as world art museums. 2 This change is significant; it enables practices that have historically been refused the status

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Maria Madeira, who was born in Timor-Leste in 1969, can be considered to be one of the founders of what came to be termed as the 'Movimentu Kultura'-a group of contemporary artistic practices that engages 'fragments of traditions' and involves the entire artistic community of Timor-Leste. Madeira's artistic activity has always been inspired and sustained by the culture of Timor-Leste. Initially a voice of resistance in exile, Madeira's contemporary approach is aimed at her fellow citizens, especially Timorese women.

The exhibition Mecarõ, Amazonia in the Petitgas Collection should have run in MO.CO. Hôtel des Collections (HC) in Montpellier, France, from March 3, 2020 to May 31, 2020. As the coronavirus pandemic altered the programing of the institution, Mecarõ ran through September 30, 2020.