Conversations: Space and art (in Hong Kong)

Ho Sin Tung ‘Map – Home’ (2008) Ink on paper, 21x30cm, Courtesy of the artist, Hong Kong

The following text is the article “Space and Art” by Hong Kong-based writer John Batten and originally published in Chinese for ARTCO Monthly, Taiwan, March 2010. It appears here with courtesy from the author and publisher.

Space, particularly the need for appropriate and well-planned use of public space, has been the great issue of concern in Hong Kong over the last four years. It is an issue that touches everyone living in Hong Kong, stemming from government plans for more roads, more land reclamation, more high-rise buildings, more clearing of older low-rise neighbourhoods, more shopping malls, and more – but often ill-thought out – space for the arts.

Hong Kong’s art community has encountered the issue of space both as a social issue and by specifically responding to government expansion plans for the ‘creative industries’ and the building of a range of new cultural venues, agitating for freedom of expression in public spaces and initiating art activities away from official venues – a response, out of necessity, as public art venues often operate conservatively with restrictive exhibition practices.

Street art by Hong Kong designer ‘Start From Zero’, under Wong Chuk Hang, Hong Kong Island flyover – on display for 4 days before being removed by street cleaners. (Photo: John Batten)
Hong Kong has a limited art scene with less than a hundred exhibition venues of different types, with the majority falling within the decorative range of the art spectrum. However, interesting cracks of artistic excellence can always be found, at any time, offering more substance than the publicized exhibitions seen in most commercial art galleries; for example, the small artist-run space, C&G Artpartment, in Prince Edward, Blue Lotus Gallery in Fo Tan and 1aspace in the Cattle Depot in To Kwa Wan. The Hong Kong Museum of Art, after years of focusing on exhibiting traditional Chinese and established European art, recently broadened its scope with a series of four specially curated exhibitions featuring younger Hong Kong artists.

In contrast, the proposed US$3 billion West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD) is just not on the radar for Hong Kong’s grass-roots arts community. Its big budget and associated big talk around its construction have made it an unwieldy political and bureaucratic football whose players, currently and unfortunately, fail to look at quality arts and cultural event delivery to the public. The project continues to focus on the physical buildings to be built, including a museum, concert halls and performing arts venues, and their ‘look’ rather than exploring fundamental curatorial, collection and arts management issues related to the museum to be built and its crossover with Hong Kong’s two existing large public museums. 1. There is, however, recognition that delays over the construction of the WKCD sends an embarrassing message about the government’s commitment to its arts and culture policies; consequently, the recent funding of adjunct exhibitions including the Hong Kong-Shenzhen Architecture Biennial and the Budding Winter art installations in four parks by visual art students, is an attempt to create an interim momentum while the public waits for the WKCD to eventually open.

Hong Kong’s lack of a diverse range of exhibition spaces has meant that I have often, over the years, advised visitors on a limited stay in Hong Kong to just walk its marvelous older urban streets: the city’s history, social and cultural rhythms will be revealed quicker than most visits to a museum or art gallery! The visual landscape seen in these older urban areas can be wonderful: neon signs, hand-painted advertising, public notices, a varied almost-mediaeval street life, subtle architectural detailing, and a variety of shops and businesses. These areas are increasingly under threat of demolition.

One of the most visible signs of change since Hong Kong’s return to China in 1997 has been the determination of Hong Kong authorities to impose stricter control over the physical spaces that lie between private property and obvious public facilities. The current “Clean Hong Kong” campaign seen ad nauseum on billboards, television and the radio is the latest attempt to curtail Hong Kong’s unique street culture and restrict individual expression in public areas. However, officious diligence has its limits and areas that are generally unsupervised (e.g. Hong Kong’s service back alleys and road flyovers), historically public (e.g. street markets and ferry pier forecourts), or common points of meeting (e.g. crowded street corners or overpasses) have traditionally been places to see the type of vernacular street decoration mentioned above. Over the last five years, anonymous artists have also begun using these places to display their own art: stickers, graffiti, transfers, murals, painting and stenciling – following in the steps of and inspired by Tsang Tsou Choi, the ‘King of Kowloon’, whose ubiquitous graffiti in a naïve calligraphic hand was a feature of unsupervised public spaces throughout Hong Kong prior to 2000 when sickness curtailed his activities.

Simultaneously, there has been a migration of art of the street into galleries with Schoeni Art Gallery and new gallery No Borders Art featuring a range of local and international street artists, but the best can still be seen where it is intended: in the city’s back alleys and under flyovers, with designer/artist Start From Zero being the best.

Vernacular street-level art and the government’s current cleaning frenzy reflect wider issues: on one hand is Hong Kong’s special character and ambiance, its dogmatic Cantonese individuality and on the other is a bureaucratic top-down approach to setting public policy. A dramatic and decisive flash point was the demolition, to allow a reclamation and six-lane roadway, of the historic harbourfront ‘Star’ Ferry building in 2006 and the threatened demolition of the adjacent Queen’s Pier a few months later which coalesced, at the time, in the public calling for better heritage conservation and urban planning, demands for a drastic improvement in air pollution levels and greater attention to people’s quality of life. Photographer Tse Chi-tak documented the three-month occupation of Queen’s Pier by protesters in 2007, publishing Heaven Queen Earth King – photos of Queen’s Pier, a prescient survey of the frustrations that many young people feel towards inflexible and poor official decision-making.

The issues in dispute were often arguments over physical structures (the ‘Star’ Ferry building, Queen’s Pier and, also in 2007, the wanton vandalism of a 1930s ‘Mandarin’-styled house, King Yin Lei, by a property developer who wished to bypass building regulations), but at a deeper level it is a difference in perceptions about cultural expression and a subtle tug-of-war of wills. Deeper still, is the fact that public demand for universal suffrage and greater democracy is never far from any issue where the public’s sentiments and government policy differ.

Protest signage against construction of Express Railway Line to China outside Legislative Council, Statue Square, 2010 (Photo: John Batten)

During and after the initial protests over the demolition of the ‘Star’ Ferry, artists and students became increasingly involved in the evolving issue of the public’s right to use space that had been inappropriately resumed by property developers for their sole use (particularly Times Square in Causeway Bay), despite land use leases that allowed the public to have rights of access and passive use of the same land. By organizing performances, installations, protests, writing in the press and using the Internet in innovative ways, artists provided a strongly visual profile alongside other community groups who strategically lobbied the government and used statutory town planning mechanisms with great success to force changes in government planning policies. In early 2010, groups of young people (recently coined the “post-1980s generation” 2), were the spirited face of large protests, including solemn art performances, against the construction of a US$9 billion express rail-line linking Hong Kong into a China-wide network.

Protest signage against construction of Express Railway Line to China, depicting the train line and locations it will affect along its route, 1 July 2010. (Photo: John Batten)

In mid-2009 crowds flocked to A Passion for Creation, a Louis Vuitton organised exhibition at the Hong Kong Museum of Art. However, it was the display of Hong Kong contemporary artists and their artistic purity that impressed rather than the ostentatious main event with its obvious commercial presentation of luggage and the dubious ease of organizing an exhibition that comprised almost solely of easily transported international artist videos and films.

Artists protesting outside the Museum about its commercial sell-out and pandering to the Louis Vuitton brand name offered passersby a flyer showing a cartoon of the Museum with a witty “this space for rent” sign. Ironically overhead, Richard Prince’s banners of steamy B-grade novellas on the Museum’s outer walls could have been an artistic knockout (despite its allied use of the exhibition sponsor’s logo) but descended into mediocrity due to design changes demanded by bureaucrats worried about the supposedly racy subject matter. 3

Visual artists and film directors have for many years used Hong Kong’s urban environment as a particular expression of Hong Kong cultural identity. Artists, including Chu Hing-wah, Luke Ching Chin-wei, Tsang Tak Ping, Leung Chi Wo – even, obliquely, Luis Chan; designers Stanley Wong (aka anothermountainman) and GOD’s Douglas Young, photographers So Hing Keung and Tse Chi Tak; and film directors Ann Hui, Patrick Tam, Fruit Chan and Wong Ka-wai have each offered a strongly articulated view of Hong Kong and depicted Hong Kong as a place with a unique urban feel, great passion and individuality. Contrast the studied depiction of Hong Kong in, for example, Fruit Chan’s movies Little Cheung (1998), Hollywood Hong Kong (2001) and Lam Wah Chuen’s Runaway Pistol (2002), against the sanitized rose-coloured depiction of Hong Kong offered by Hong Kong government agencies and tourist authorities. If Hong Kong’s ephemeral and unique urban streetscapes disappear, how then will Hong Kong films, visual art and TV then depict this city?

After a rollercoaster ride prior to the 2008 financial meltdown, the Hong Kong art scene has seen a cleansing twelve months of sobriety and a subtle maturing by audiences towards over-hyped exhibitions and inflated contemporary Chinese art prices. Although the auction houses dominate art sales figures and have a high profile, their daily involvement in the art scene is non-existent – indeed, although the Mainland Chinese art market appears to be prominent, the number of galleries in Hong Kong actually exhibiting art from China is relatively few. It is a conundrum possibly explained by the simple fact that Hong Kong continues to lack contemporary art collectors.

Enthusiasm by the arts community, and meeting a need due to conservative official visual arts programming, has seen a range of self-initiated art offerings. Soundpocket recently organized the stimulating Around Sound Festival on Lamma Island and the first Sculpture by the Sea was successfully held along the Repulse Bay and Deepwater Bay coastline – both these events could consolidate into worthwhile projects in future years. Despite (but probably due to!), government financial support the long-running yearly Microwave Festival wallows; its new media games arcade-type experimentation has become tiresome, the festival has reached its sell-by date.

A younger generation of motivated artist organizers has improved the diversity of art activities and events in Hong Kong. Complaints Choir has evolved into a tight unit and their English and Cantonese song renditions have built a cult following using the support structure of 1aspace in To Kwa Wan. The publicly funded Shanghai Street Art Space has been taken over by Woofer Ten, a diverse collective of artists and writers, whose interest in Hong Kong culture will give principle organizer and art critic Jaspar Lau a physical space in which to display the group’s ideas around culture, community engagement, politics and aesthetics.

C&G Artpartment has developed an eclectic exhibition and curatorial programme and actively uses YouTube to broadcast its informative and amusing ADC interviews of art events around town. The word play on “ADC” (or “Arts Development Council” – a statutory body tasked with financing arts and culture projects) was also used by conceptual artist Kwan Sheung Chi in his ADC or ArtWalk Drinking Contest performed during ArtWalk 2009 and which later evolved into an on-going series of videos.

Until ten years ago, there was only one university-based visual arts school – at the Chinese University of Hong Kong – producing a handful of artists. The subsequent increase in undergraduate and postgraduate visual arts programmes has seen a burgeoning diversity of art practice and a critical mass of artists talking about and, importantly, involved in quality art production. The enthusiasm of practicing artists/art teachers, including the younger Magdalen Wong and Lukas Tam, mid-career Ho Siu Kee and Fiona Wong, and the slightly older generation of Chan Yuk-keung and Leung Mee Ping, plus healthy competition between the different art schools and the eclectic offerings of visiting overseas art teachers (predominantly from Australia’s RMIT University) has seen a marked increase in ‘alumni’ support and a culture of artistic insularity making the entire art scene internally stronger and confident with its own initiatives.

Tsang Kin-wah, Doggie! (2007) Acrylic, emulsion and silkscreen on canvas, 91.4×122cm Courtesy of the artist, Hong Kong

As a generalization, Hong Kong art is markedly different from Mainland Chinese art (with which it is inevitably compared against) and which – almost consciously – ignores much of the influence of international art trends. Work is often tactile, hand-worked and construction based, on the edge of sculpture, often using found, natural or recycled objects and inspired by local cultural imperatives. Much art touches on the absurdity of a situation, surrealist and dada in essence; the art and newspaper articles of Luke Ching Chin-wei, in this respect, has had particular influence on a younger generation of artists due to his uncompromising individuality, personal rapport and purity of social and political messages.

Halley Cheng  Fan-shape (detail) (2007) Pen, pencil, oil on wood 48x36in, Image courtesy of artist & Grotto Fine Art, Hong Kong

Younger artists, for example Lee Kit, Magdalen Wong, Enoch Cheung, Hanison Lau, Hei Ng Ka Chun, Otto Li, Tozer Pak, Tang Kwok Hin and Lui Long Tin have all recently produced three-dimensional work that touches on the absurd, often with a subtle political and social commentary. The offbeat can also be seen in painting and the graphic arts; Angela Su’s detailed drawings and Wilson Shieh’s ink paintings deal with aspects of the bizarre or quirky; Halley Cheng’s use of Song-dynasty styled paintings often contain a subversive modern twist; Sushan Chan’s social commentary in illustration and Ho Sin Tung’s wry observations of Hong Kong’s busy youth using references from film and the Internet styled with her own typography. Tsang Kin-wah’s use of profanity (with the Cantonese being particularly explicit) patterned within a William Morris inspired wallpaper design gives the viewer a jolt once the juxtaposition is understood. It has only been a recent development that Hong Kong artists’ practice has become multi-faceted; it is refreshing to see video, photography, installation and two-dimensional work included in an artist’s portfolio.

Contemporary Mainland Chinese art often has a monumentality that demands a ‘wow!’ reaction, but quickly tires as the same suggestive trick is repeated, while Hong Kong art beckons the viewer to step in and appreciate the finer details of both message and media. There is also a refreshing lack of pandering to the market, but this soft approach has meant few Hong Kong artists are recognizably known – even in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong has a pivotal economic, political and social role within the Pearl River Delta, and there is great understanding that regional art events – particularly the Guangzhou Photo Biennial and the Guangzhou Triennial – are equally important for Hong Kong’s art community. A group of young Hong Kong artists, including the hard-working Doris Wong Wai Yin, recently opened Observation Society, an art space in Guangzhou. The Hong Kong based Asia Art Archive’s substantial physical and online information and library of images has consolidated its place for Asian art researchers around the world. It is obvious that Hong Kong’s unparalleled infrastructure, freedom of expression, rule of law and transparent information systems makes it the primary link in the Delta; it is a truth – or, should I say, a space – within which good art can be built.

Notes:
1. The government announced in February 2010 that Hong Kong’s two public art museums, the Hong Kong Museum of Art and the Heritage Museum, would not be independently governed, despite consistent recommendations by consultation panels of art professionals over the previous nine years. The arts community were understandably upset but not surprised by the decision.

2. The term “post-1980s generation” was originally coined in China to describe self-centred Chinese youth not interested in social issues; the term in Hong Kong, however, has the opposite meaning, describing young Hong Kong people who are disillusioned by a lack of democracy and poor decision-making and who are agitating for change.

3. These imposed design changes were explained by artist Richard Prince in a public talk at Hong Kong Museum of Art, 22 May 2009.

Aspects of this essay appeared in John Batten: ‘Hong Kong’s Cracks of Interest’, originally published in the French Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong’s magazine, Echo, December 2009 and John Batten: ‘Something In the Air’, South China Morning Post, 29 December 2009.

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Thank you to the author, Yishu Journal, and ARTCO Monthly for their support.