In varied manners and to a greater or lesser extent, “Mobile M+: Inflation!” which took place at the West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD), the first ever Art Basel Hong Kong and the HAB (Home Affairs Bureau) -funded “Fotanian Open Studios”, engaged with the Hong Kong community in 2013. Mammoth artworks in “Mobile M+: Inflation!” were displayed in the outdoor park of WKCD, welcoming physical contact with the audiences: for example visitors can jump and bounce on Sacrilege by Jeremy Deller (UK), or walk and sit among the ribs of the “roasted suckling pig” House of Treasures by Cao Fei (China). The curators of the Exhibition expected that by “inviting members of the public to interact firsthand with large-scale inflatable sculptures, ‘Mobile M+: Inflation!’ aims to pose questions about the nature of public art and the ways in which audiences might engage with it.” Whether this could be achieved by freeing the community the etiquetle of visiting a proper art museum is up to the evaluation of M+ and its stakeholders. This exhibition, together with the transaction-focused Art Basel Hong Kong, and Fotanian Open Studios which has evolved from a grass-root endeavor to a publicly-funded, commercially-sponsored event, provided reference to how Hong Kong as a “creative city” can be imagined.

The sense of nativeness has been gradually growing since Hong Kong’s handover sixteen years ago. The community is concerned about the preservation of buildings imbued with historical values. Arts practitioners, through community arts, explore what “Hong Kong” means to its citizens besides economic activities. The HKSAR Government takes reference of overseas examples and “revitalizes” some old buildings by taking in tenants from the “creative industries.” Hence, the old Police Married Quarters on Hollywood Road, Central, has been refurbished as “PMQ”. Another form of revitalization is to turn the venue into exhibition space, for example the old Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club is now “Oi!”. Following the trend of “revitalization” and responding to the demand of artists, ADC made an agreement with “Hip Shing Hong” and launched “ADC Arts Space Scheme”. Some from the community felt that revitalization projects of such nature had buildings refurbished at the price of severing community network. “Woofer Ten”, the organization which has been building relationship with local residents through arts by being stationed on Shanghai Street for four years, would no longer receive ADC venue subsidy and would have to move out of its current premise on December 31.

The Council of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (HKADC) comprises of the Chairman, Vice-Chairman, and twenty-five Members. Ten out of the twenty-five members are selected through a “Nomination of Representatives of Arts Interests” exercise (dubbed “the Election” by arts practitioners and the media) held once every three years. The ten “arts interests” are “Arts Administration”, “Arts Criticism”, “Arts Education”, “Chinese Opera (Xiqu)”, “Dance”, “Drama”, “Film Arts”, “Literary Arts”, “Music” and “Visual Arts”. The term of office of the members before the election would expire on December 31, 2013. ADC therefore had to conduct the eighth nomination exercise within 2013 so that members serving a new term from January 1, 2014 to December 31, 2016 could be elected.

This essay considers the kinds of art writing that document, critically respond to and generate discourse about art. Creative writing responses to works of art are a separate discussion that beckons another piece of writing itself. Here at Asia Art Archive, art writing is one of the predominant types of content in the materials we come across. From secondary materials such as art historical volumes and essays in exhibition catalogs, to primary materials like typescripts of exhibition reviews, drafts of lecture notes, curatorial statements, personal correspondences; the list goes on.

We often use art writing to prove a viewpoint, or frame a narrative. This can sometimes be at the expense of the stories that art writing, their medium, and the circulation itself tell. The vast amount of art writing that we encounter on an everyday basis at the Archive, and the many forms they take, prompts us to try thinking the other way around – to focus our attention on the art writing itself and its circulation. How does a particular space and time shape a medium in circulation? How and why did a particular medium of art writing start, what did they actually do? What kind of ideas were beings sent out, and to whom? Did it build up a community of writers and readers / audiences, and if it did, who were / are they?

Assessing Influence: Art, Auctions and Audiences in Hong Kong

The essay is a museological enquiry into how museum visitors assign meanings to their visits and their interpretive strategies for connecting with the arts. Adhering to specific theoretical rationale, research methodologies and analytical framework, the writers have identified five different models of visiting experiences based on the visitors’ personal motivation, interpretation of experiences, and general perception of art and cultural activities, namely, connoisseurs, enthusiastic learners, curious viewers, leisurely wanderers and passive visitors. Characteristics of each model is discussed in details. The writers hope that the research will produce useful knowledge about Hong Kong art visitors for the benefit of art administrators and museum professionals in considering how to interact with visitors in a meaningful way.

The writer starts by explaining the connotations of “public art”, suggesting that public sculpture has been the art form that receives most resources deployed for public art in Hong Kong. Hong Kong’s public sculptures were first promoted by commercial corporations, such as the property projects by Hongkong Land Limited and Swire Properties Limited, and further supported by the public art projects of Government departments, including the Sculpture Walk and Sculpture Garden in Kowloon Park, the outdoor sculptures of the Hong Kong Museum of Art and the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, and the artworks in the public facilities of the new towns and public housing estates. The writer also mentions the community projects launched by the District Councils and the feedback they received, elaborating on the impact of the number of public artworks and their display in the local cityscape. In addition, this essay touches on temporary public art projects and looks at their advantages by taking “Mobile M+: Inflation” as an example. It deals with integration between public art and the everyday life of the public. Successful examples include the High Line Park in New York and the “Tamar Development Project” in Hong Kong. Finally, the writer expresses his hopes for the development of public art in the future.

The publication of the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education (HKDSE) results, in its third year in 2013, coincided with mounting concern over its marking schemes and assessment criteria. Visual arts, among other HKDSE subjects, is a major source of worry for many local visual arts teachers. At the Legislative Council meeting on April 17, 2013, Ma Fung-kwok, Legislative Council Member for the “Sports, Performing Arts, Culture and Publication” Functional Constituency, urged the Education Bureau to examine the reasons for the increase in the number of students dropping the Visual Arts subject. On May Fourth in the same year, the day that marks the intellectual, cultural and political movement growing out of student demonstrations in Beijing in 1919, disgruntled Hong Kong student and teacher representatives took to the streets as a protest to the authorities over the newly announced revisions to the assessment guide for the Visual Arts subject in the HKDSE. This essay will study the impacts and outcomes that the “New Senior Secondary Academic Structure” have had on visual arts education in Hong Kong since its implementation, and shed lights on the pressing issues and problems facing education arts in Hong Kong.

Free trade has been a rock on the back of the Hong Kong economy, but the intensifying pace of globalization is forcing the city to develop its edge. The government’s vision for arts and cultural development in the new millennium is to build a brand image for the city by investing heavily in cultural infrastructure and creating a strong driving force for the territory’s economy, business and finance. The West Kowloon Cultural District project is one of such large-scale initiatives designed to facilitate the long-term development of the city as an international arts and cultural metropolis and transform the district into an arts hub. To stimulate a transition to the creative economy, various polices and measures for the creative industries have been outlined in policy addresses and budget speeches under the three administrations since the 1997 handover. Nurturing talent in the arts became an integral part of social development and local schools had to diversify in function with the aim to develop and supply a large pool of creative and arts management talent for future social development. At the same time, there emerged a need to cultivate a love and knowledge of the arts in the general public and turn them into discerning audiences and consumers of the arts. Only then would the city be equipped with the competitive edge to meet the challenges that the new millennium brought.

As one of the cultural treasures in China, calligraphy has been held in high esteem, particularly by the intelligentsia and elite culture in traditional society. Calligraphers express their emotions and convey their ideas through the combination of the visual language from under the brush and the meaning of the characters. For nearly a hundred years, despite the impact of western culture on Hong Kong, a number of calligraphers have insisted on embodying the national essence of calligraphy in the city.

At the beginning of the 20th century, a series of political changes in China drew the intelligentsia, calligraphers and painters to Hong Kong, laying a sound and traditionally-rooted foundation for the development of calligraphy in Hong Kong. A few authors have highlighted the Hong Kong calligraphy community’s “contribution to the perpetuation and preservation of the tradition” and their significance in the Chinese calligraphy history at the turn of the century. Migrated from China to Hong Kong in the early 1950s, Han Yunshan (1923-2010) was a typical scholar-calligrapher who stressed the importance of traditions and cultivation, keeping alive the development of the traditional art form in Hong Kong in the early 20th century.

Research on major calligraphers from the cultural circles and art communities in Hong Kong, their calligraphic works and activities has always been valued, and there have been a decent amount of research done on the topics. However, for fine calligraphers like Han Yunshan, who worked quietly and had no desire to be famous, the extent of study is minimal. This essay will look into Han Yunshan’s artistic journey of calligraphy with the focus on his unique approach to clerical script of the Han Dynasty (206BC – AD220) as the foundation of a convergence of the stele and model-book studies.

After years of continuous consultation and planning, the Town Planning Board announced the development blueprint of the West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD) in 2013, officially signifying the commencement of the construction stage of WKCD. Despite facing financial pressure, the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority (WKCDA) held a design competition in 2012 for M+ (scheduled to open in 2017), appointed Mainland Chinese academic Pi Li as Senior Curator for Chinese contemporary art, and began their acquisition process.