French masterpieces to make first impression in Hong Kong
Jan. 20, 2005

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laude Monet's 'Water Lilies,' seen here, will be one of 47 French impressionist masterpieces that will be exhibited in Hong Kong for the first time as part of 'The Year of France in China'(AFP/EPA/File)

HONG KONG (AFP) - Some 47 Impressionist masterpieces will have their Hong Kong debut in an exhibition next week, the government said.

As part of "The Year of France in China", the internationally-acclaimed works of art will be on display in the former British colony for the first time.

They include Edouard Manet's "The Fifer"; Edgar Degas' "The Dance Class" and "In a Cafe, the Absinthe"; Claude Monet's "Rouen Cathedral, the Portal, Harmony in Brown" and "Water Lilies"; and Pierre-Auguste Renoir's "Woman, Torso in the Sun".

There will also be works by Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, Paul Cezanne and others -- all on loan from the prestigious Musee d'Orsay and other French national collections.

The exhibition, "Impressionism: Treasures from the National Collection of France", will be held at the Hong Kong Museum of Art from February 5 to April 10.

I love impressionistic paintings and music! Especially Claude Monet's paintings~
I would love to go to the Museum if I am in HK > <

SHA's speech at the opening ceremony of an exhibition on Impressionism
Friday, February 4, 2005

Following is the speech by the Secretary for Home Affairs, Dr Patrick Ho, at the opening ceremony of the exhibition "Impressionism: Treasures from the National Collection of France" held at the Hong Kong Museum of Art today (February 4):

The Honourable Tung Chee Hwa, the Chief Executive, Mr Serge Mostura, Consul General of France in Hong Kong, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Good evening. It gives me great pleasure to welcome you all to the opening of the exhibition "Impressionism: Treasures from the National Collection of France". This exhibition, a highlight programme of the Year of France in China, marks the friendship and fruit of co-operation between the two countries.

In this year's policy address, the Chief Executive has stressed that developing cultural and creative industries is one of the new growth areas for our economy. Hong Kong is well positioned to develop cultural and creative industries because we are a pluralistic and inclusive society and a confluence of Eastern and Western cultures. I am sure Impressionism will be welcomed by our citizens with the same enthusiasm, as it has inspired creative talents of the world for the last hundred years.

Presentation of the exhibition in Hong Kong also reinforces our position as an international city of art and culture. Here I would like to express my sincere thanks to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Culture and Communication and the Consulate General of France in Hong Kong for bringing this significant show to Hong Kong. My thanks are also due to the generous sponsorship from HSBC and the French sponsors, LVMH, Moet Henessy, Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior. In addition, I would like to thank the Musee d' Orsay and other French national museums for lending us these valuable masterpieces.

Lastly, may I wish the exhibition every success and I look forward to more cultural exchanges between China and France in future.

Thank you and a Happy Lunar New Year to you all.

$2b mainland treasures set for HK exhibition
The collection of artefacts comes from 46 museums
Quinton Chan
14 February 2005
South China Morning Post

More than 300 artefacts valued at just over $2 billion will go on display in Hong Kong next month in the largest exhibition of Chinese national treasures to leave the mainland.

The exhibition, "From Eastern Han to High Tang", tells the story of the fall of the Han dynasty, the coming of the Xianbei nomadic tribes and other nomads, the Silk Road, as well as reunification in the Tang dynasty.

The collection, which will run from March 12 to June 10, has just been shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and will be taken to Japan after it closes in Hong Kong.

Most of the exhibits, assembled by the State Bureau of Cultural Relics from 46 museums in 14 provinces, are recent archaeological discoveries.

Tom Ming, chief curator of the Hong Kong Heritage Museum where the three-month exhibition will be held, said it focused on an era from the late Han to the Tang dynasty (AD200-AD750), a time of war and political chaos also marked by massive east-west cultural exchanges.

Mr Ming said about 70 per cent of the 300 objects were "class one" treasure. Of those, 10 textile items discovered on the Silk Road, as well as another 10 wall paintings, were extremely rare.

Although most of the objects are Chinese works of art, the exhibition also includes gold artefacts of the nomadic tribes from Mongolia, who entered northern China after the collapse of the Han dynasty, and luxury articles of glass and precious metal imported from western and Central Asia in the fourth to sixth centuries.

Some of the most famous early Chinese Buddhist sculptures are included, as well as a spectacular assemblage of works in every medium from the Tang period, interpreted as the culmination of several centuries of cultural exchange and adaptation.

The curator said the most valuable exhibit was a Sui dynasty (581-619 AD) sarcophagus, excavated from the tomb of Yu Hong in Shanxi province , valued at $62.4 million.

Another key exhibit is a 5th century earthenware groom and horse, found in Inner Mongolia.

300 national treasures on display at Heritage Museum
Government Press Release
Sunday, March 13, 2005

More than 300 invaluable relics will be featured at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum from tomorrow (March 14) until June 10, showing the artistic and cultural changes that took place in China from Eastern Han to High Tang (25-755).

The exhibition, "From Eastern Han to High Tang: A Journey of Transculturation", is jointly presented by the State Administration of Cultural Heritage and the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, organised by the Heritage Museum and Art Exhibitions China and sponsored by the Tsui Art Foundation.

Officiating guests attending the exhibition's opening ceremony today (March 13) included the Secretary for Home Affairs, Dr Patrick Ho Chi-ping; the Deputy Director-General of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, Mr Tong Mingkang; the Standing Member of National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Mr Tsui Tsin-tong; the Director of Leisure and Cultural Services, Ms Anissa Wong Sean-yee; the Director-General of Publicity, Culture and Sports Department, the Liaison Office of The Central People's Government in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Ms Zhang Yanjun.

The cultural relics on display were selected from 46 museums and cultural institutions in 14 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. Many of these national treasures are grade-one relics from the most significant archaeological discoveries in the past 50 years. They include valuable wooden objects of the Han dynasty, pottery guardian figures and Buddhist sculptures of the Northern dynasties, porcelain ware of the Southern dynasties and objects imported from Western Asia and beyond, such as glassware, gold and silverware and gold coins.

At the end of the Eastern Han in AD 220 there emerged a number of political leaders, and the state of fragmentation into which China was plunged lasted for nearly 400 years. Political disarray did not, however, impede cultural development. The period of the Three Kingdoms, the Jin dynasty and the period of the Southern and Northern dynasties were a time when China was receptive to many foreign influences, particularly from Central and Western Asia, this all-embracing ethos culminating in the glorious Tang dynasty.

The exhibition is divided into six sections. Section One covers the Eastern Han period. Highlights of the exhibition include a retinue of bronze carriages and mounted guards unearthed from Wuwei, Gansu, and a large pottery model of a watchtower that demonstrates the power of wealthy landowners in the late Han period.

Section Two introduces 2nd¡V5th-century artefacts of the Xianbei and other northern peoples, the Xianbei's distinctive style most tellingly illustrated by a group of objects with animal motifs. The Buddhist images and secular objects with Buddhist decorative motifs featured at the exhibition attest to the mixture of Han and Xianbei characteristics.

Section Three covers the Hexi region (west of the Yellow river) and Gansu, highlighting the fusion of artistic conventions between various peoples along the Silk Road. Textiles, gold and silverware imported from Central Asia, and early Buddhist statues illustrate the flow of objects in an easterly direction.

Section Four displays works of traditional Chinese themes and styles of the Eastern Jin and the Southern dynasties. Highlight ¡Vare a nautilus cup and the glass vessels with ground decoration, which bear witness to the quality of imported goods from the west.

Section Five covers the Northern dynasties. Through 6th-century artefacts the effects of transculturation whereby east and west, Han Chinese and non-Han Chinese were altered through contact with each other are made manifest. The Northern Qi Buddhist figures carved in stone and ornamented with gilding recovered from Longxingsi in Shandong are superb examples of the sculpture of this period.

Section Six displays relics of the Sui and Tang dynasties. These include pottery with three-colour glazes, porcelain, stone and bronze statues, gold and silver vessels, jade, jewellery, and rarely seen paintings and textiles, some of the latter unearthed from Turfan. These relics evolved in style from those developed in north China during the period of the Northern dynasties to reach a level of splendid achievement in the High Tang period.

To coincide with the exhibition, a series of activities will be organised. A seminar will be held on April 17, from 2.30pm to 5.30pm. The speakers include the Honorary Professor of Fine Arts, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Professor Ho Puay-peng; the Honorary Professor of Fine Arts and the Director of Art Museum, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Professor Peter Lam; Dr Simon Kwan (PhD in Fine Arts, University of Hong Kong) and Ms Xu Xiaodong (PhD in Fine Arts, the Chinese University of Hong Kong). They will discuss the transculturation of east and west in ancient China from the Buddhist images, ceramic works, gold ware and clothing. For details of the seminar and reservation of seats, please contact the Education Team of the Heritage Museum at 2180 8260.

A fully illustrated catalogue will be available at the Gift Shop of the Heritage Museum.

Located at 1 Man Lam Road in Sha Tin, the Heritage Museum opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. It is closed on Tuesdays (except public holidays). Admission is $10, with a half-price concession for senior citizens aged 60 or above, people with disabilities and full-time students. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

A free shuttle bus operates between the Sha Tin KCR Station and the Heritage Museum from 1pm to 6pm on Saturdays and from 1pm to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays.

For enquiries, call 2180 8188. For details of the exhibition, visit the Heritage Museum's website at http://hk.heritage.museum/.

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Science and history attract museum visitors over art
Carrie Chan
14 March 2005
South China Morning Post

Despite all the hype about the West Kowloon cultural hub, most Hongkongers are still more interested in going to science and space museums.

Even the history of rail lures more people than art.

While property developers bidding for the West Kowloon project have been promoting arts over the past year, attendance figures at the city's museums give no evidence of a change in taste.

Museums of modern art, ink, design and moving images are planned for the cultural district.

Last year, overall visitor figures to 12 museums and the film archive dropped from 5.03 million in 2002 to 4.57 million.

The Science Museum and Space Museum are the only museums where attendance figures exceeded 780,000 last year. The Museum of History came third, with 658,000 visits.

The Heritage Museum experienced a sharp drop in attendance from 958,800 in 2001 to 632,300 last year.

The Railway Museum was also more popular than the Museum of Art, attracting 388,510 visitors, while the latter attracted only 271,400.

Ho Kam-chuen, chief curator of heritage museum services, said surveys showed Hong Kong people had always preferred science museums and their second choice would be history museums. He also had an explanation for the dip in figures at the Heritage Museum. "It opened in 2000. According to our experience, a new museum sees rising visitor figures in the first two years. Then they slightly fall and stabilise."

He refused to comment on whether the combination of museums in the West Kowloon cultural district was incompatible with people's tastes, saying the district's components were subject to change.

Meanwhile, attendance at 13 performing arts venues proved more stable. Overall attendance dropped from 2.78 million in 2002 to 2.75 million last year.

Assistant director of performing arts Agnes Tang In-kwan said there were always people who had to be turned away because events were so popular.

The booking rate recorded at most civic centres was more than 90 per cent.

"That's why we think West Kowloon's new venues will add impetus to the cultural scene," she said.

$2b worth of treasuresexpected todraw 150,000
Lu Man-yan
14 March 2005
South China Morning Post

About 150,000 people are expected to visit an exhibition of national treasures that starts today at the Heritage Museum at Sha Tin and runs until June 10.

"From Eastern Han to High Tang: A Journey of Transculturation" comprises 363 treasures, including more than 250 grade-one relics, selected from 46 museums and cultural institutions in 14 provinces. It is valued at $2 billion.

"It is a rare opportunity, with about 40 museums and cultural institutions working together on an exhibition," heritage museum curator Brian Lam Kwok-fai said.

When visitors first walk into the exhibition room they will see the largest piece, a Han dynasty wooden sculpture called Wood Chariot and Horse, which was excavated in Gansu province in 1972.

The most valuable relic, the Marble Sarcophagus valued at $62.4 million, is part of the Sui section and shows a fusion of Chinese and foreign cultures.

The exhibition is divided into six sections: Eastern Han: The Beginning of Disintegration; The Rise of the Xianbei; The Silk Road; The Southern Dynasties: Economic and Cultural Developments South of the Yangzi; The Northern Dynasties: Regime Changes; and Sui and Tang: Efflorescence.

Arts Festival has best season in 33 years
Kevin Kwong
21 March 2005
South China Morning Post

Despite jazz violinist Regina Carter cancelling at the last minute and founding members of The Blind Boys of Alabama Clarence Fountain being too ill to travel with the rest of their gospel choir, the Hong Kong Arts Festival has recorded its highest ticket sales for 33 years.

With more than 104,000 people packing the festival venues over the past five weeks, the 123 performances grossed more than $28.5 million, exceeding last year's sales figure by $2 million.

More than half the shows were sold out.

Festival executive director Douglas Gautier partly attributed this year's box-office success to the varied mix of programmes that were on offer.

"We certainly tried to anticipate and stimulate the needs of the audience that we know, and we do take a lot of care of that," he said.

"In areas where our audience is building, say in world music and particularly locally based theatre, and also commissioned works from China like Amber, they brought in new audiences and I think that is important."

Among the sold-out programmes were the visually stunning The Palace of Eternal Youth by the Jiangsu Kun Opera, and the complete Beethoven Symphonic Cycle performed by Frans Bruggen's Orchestra of the 18th Century, as well as the National Theatre Company of China's Amber directed by Meng Jinghui.

English subtitles were widely available this year for all Cantonese/Mandarin shows such as French Kiss to make local dramas more accessible to non-Chinese speaking theatregoers.

"So we've made that investment," Mr Gautier said.

"It's opened another market for us. A small one, but an important one."

Written by Chong Mui-ngam, French Kiss has been invited to Seoul by the Theatre Director's Association of Korea.

Meanwhile, Mr Gautier is already planning next year's arts festival.

"It's difficult to predict with the box office, but I think one thing we can predict is the programming and [the 2006 lineup] looks wonderful," he said.

"It opens with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra and closes with Mozart's Don Giovanni by the Semper Opera Dresden and Opera Nuremberg, and very wonderful things in between.

"I think it looks very exciting. I hope the audience will be [excited] too, and I am confident they will."

Entertainment Expo faces French invasion
Vivienne Chow
11 March 2005
South China Morning Post

This month's Entertainment Expo will receive its largest delegation from France as part of Year of France in China celebrations.

More than 60 film and television professionals from 37 French film companies and commissions will participate in the three-day Filmart event, organised under the expo by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, from March 22.

The delegation and France's consulate-general in Hong Kong will host "French Day" and "French Night" on March 23, featuring seminars and the gala screening of the hit film A Very Long Engagement. The film's director, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, will be present.

Thirty films produced and co-produced by French filmmakers have also been selected as part of this year's Hong Kong International Film Festival. The Year of France in China is a nationwide celebration of French culture.

"We are very excited to have such a large delegation. This is historic, given that the French invented movies over a hundred years ago. This will be a great exchange opportunity," said Raymond Yip Chak-yan, the Trade Development Council's service promotion director. Mr Yip said this year's Filmart would be the largest since it was first held nine years ago. More than 2,000 visitors are expected.

"Up until now, 343 exhibitors have registered, including 87 from Hong Kong and 256 from overseas," said Mr Yip.

Twenty Asian films will premiere at Filmart, including the recent Berlinale Silver Bear winners Peacock by Gu Changwei and The Wayward Cloud by Tsai Ming-liang.

Filmart and the film festival are two of the eight events being held as part of the Entertainment Expo. The government has said it hopes the expo can become the "Cannes of Asia".

About 1,000 guests will join the gala opening of the Entertainment Expo on March 21, featuring dozens of movie stars, including Tony Leung Chiu-wai and an international star yet to be announced, and musical performances by guests including Coco Lee.

Impressionist masterpieces attract over 170,000 visitors
Thursday, March 24, 2005
Government Press Release

More than 170,000 have viewed the exhibition "Impressionism: Treasures from the National Collection of France" at the Hong Kong Museum of Art since its opening on February 5.

To date, the exhibition has attracted 174,768 visitors, a new attendance record for art exhibitions staged at the Museum of Art.

The exhibition, which showcases 48 masterpieces selected from the Musee d' Orsay in Paris and other major French museums, runs until April 10. Members of the public are urged to grab this rare opportunity to discover the richness of the Impressionist masterpieces on display.

The exhibition opens from 10am to 8pm daily and closes on Thursdays, except public holidays.

Admission for this exhibition is $30 from Friday to Tuesday, and $20 on Wednesdays. A half-price concession is available for senior citizens aged 60 or above, full-time students and people with disabilities. For any purchase of 20 regular tickets or more, admission is $21 each from Friday to Tuesday, and $14 each on Wednesdays.

The Museum of Art is located at 10 Salisbury Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon. For details of the exhibition, visit the Museum of Art's website at http://hk.art.museum. For enquiries, call 2721 0116.

National treasures attract 87,000 visitors
Thursday, April 7, 2005
Government Press Release

The exhibition "From Eastern Han to High Tang: A Journey of Transculturation" which is now running at the Heritage Museum, has attracted tens of thousand visitors since its opening on March 14.

To date, the exhibition has drawn 87,625 visitors.

"We registered more than 12,500 visitors last Wednesday (March 30), marking the highest attendance record for a single day in the past three weeks," a spokesman for the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) said today (April 7).

Visitors were fascinated with the artifacts on show which are wide in scope to vividly reflect the history and the transculturation of different regions in different periods of ancient China. Many were impressed by the exquisiteness of the ancient craftsmanship.

The education corner, which provides visitors with games to learn more about the relics and the ancient culture, proved popular with the visitors.

The exhibition features more than 300 cultural relics selected from 46 museums and cultural institutions in 14 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions.

"Many of these national treasures are grade-one relics from the most significant archaeological discoveries in the past 50 years," the LCSD's spokesman said.

The exhibits include valuable wooden objects of the Han dynasty, pottery guardian figures and Buddhist sculptures of the Northern dynasties, porcelain ware of the Southern dynasties and objects imported from Western Asia and beyond, such as glassware, gold and silverware and gold coins. The exhibition will close on June 10.

To supplement the exhibition, a series of educational activities has been organised, including a seminar to be held on April 17, from 2pm to 5.30pm.

Speakers of the seminar include the Honorary Professor of Fine Arts, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Professor Ho Puay-peng; the Honorary Professor of Fine Arts and the Director of Art Museum of Institute of Chinese Studies, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Professor Peter Lam Yip-keung; Private collector Dr Simon Kwan and Dr Xu Xiaodong.

Topics for discussion range from the transculturation of east and west in ancient China through appreciation of cultural relics of Buddhist images, to ceramic works, gold ware and clothing. Admission is free for the seminar. For details, please contact the Education Team of the Heritage Museum at 2180 8260.

Located at 1 Man Lam Road in Sha Tin, the Heritage Museum opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. It is closed on Tuesdays (except public holidays). Admission is $10, with a half-price concession for senior citizens aged 60 or above, people with disabilities and full-time students. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

Car parking spaces are available in the Heritage Museum. Besides, a free shuttle bus operates between the Sha Tin KCR Station and the Heritage Museum from 10am to 6pm on Saturdays and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays.

"Those who prefer to make use of public transport may take the KCR Ma On Shan line to the Che Kung Temple station which is within a five-minute walk to the Museum," the spokesman added.

For enquiries, call 2180 8188. For details of the exhibition, visit the Heritage Museum's website at http://hk.heritage.museum/.

Philadelphia Orchestra to perform in Hong Kong
Friday, April 8, 2005
Government Press Release

Hailed as one of the best in the world, The Philadelphia Orchestra will be in Hong Kong again for two not-to-be-missed concerts under the baton of music director Christoph Eschenbach.

The programme, presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, will be held in the Concert Hall, Hong Kong Cultural Centre.

The first concert will be at 8pm on May 31 (Tuesday) featuring Dvorak's "Carnival" Overture and Bartok's "Concerto for Orchestra". Sought-after pianist Lang Lang will be the soloist in Tchaikovsky's "Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23".

For the second concert at 8pm on June 1 (Wednesday), the orchestra will play Mozart's "Oboe Concerto in C, K.314" (Oboe Solo: Richard Woodhams) and Mahler's "Symphony No. 1 in D, 'Titan'".

Founded in 1900, The Philadelphia Orchestra has distinguished itself as one of the leading orchestras in the world. The reputable orchestra has established its standing through a century of acclaimed performances, historic international tours, best-selling recordings, and its unprecedented innovative recording technologies and outreach programmes. Christoph Eschenbach, who began his tenure as the orchestra's seventh music director in September, 2003, has carried on the rich tradition of the orchestra.

The 106-member orchestra has toured extensively and recorded more than 1,200 different musical works since its founding. It moved to its new home at The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in 2001. The orchestra has performed with the most celebrated guest artists of the past century, such as Fritz Kreisler, Isaac Stern, Vladimir Horowitz, Van Cliburn, Luciano Pavarotti, and Kiri Te Kanawa.

Eschenbach is held in high esteem by the world's foremost orchestras and opera houses for his commanding presence, versatility, and consummate musicianship. Before turning to conducting, he earned a distinguished international reputation as a pianist was awarded the first prize in the Steinway Young Pianist Competition in Germany at age 11. A prolific recording artist, Eschenbach has made numerous recordings as a conductor, pianist, or both. Among his many honours are France's Legion d'Honneur and the Officer's Cross with Star of the German Order of Merit.

Tickets priced at $780, $600, $400 and $200 are available at URBTIX outlets. Half-price tickets are available for senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients (limited tickets for students and CSSA recipients on a first-come, first-served basis) and a 10% discount applies to Friends of LCSD performing venues.

Enquiries for programme and pre-concert talks, call 2268 7321 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp. Ticketing enquiries and reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Tickets can also be booked online at www.urbtix.hk.

Heritage Museum features Huizhou architecture
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Government Press Release

The art of Huizhou architecture will be featured at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum from tomorrow (April 13) until July 11.

The exhibition features a selection of models, component parts of buildings, artifacts and furniture from Anhui Provincial Museum and local designer Kai Yin Lo.

Jointly presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department and the Anhui Provincial Museum, the "Huizhou Vernacular Architecture" exhibition showcases more than 120 sets of exquisite wood, brick and stone carvings from Huizhou. Along with a reconstruction of a main hall and a study room of a typical Huizhou dwelling, the exhibition enables the visitors to get a better understanding of traditional Huizhou, its beauty and cultured elegance, as well as a taste of the idyllic enclave.

Under the jurisdiction of Huizhou is the mountainous region of Southern Anhui, covering the Yellow Mountain, Qiyun Mountain and the upper reaches of Xinan River. Its unique geographical environment provided the migrant officials and scholars a safe haven from wars and other upheavals, and an idyllic pastoral setting in which to live and indulge in the beauty of nature.

During the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911), the emergence of a class of Hui merchants saw the flourishing of luxurious mansions, renovation of ancestral halls, and construction of roads, bridges and memorial archways.

Among the various local dwellings, the renowned villages of Xidi and Hongcun were listed as the world heritage by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in 2000.

Huizhou architecture is the embodiment of the aesthetic and ethical values of the region, evolving from the geographical settings of the area. It reflects the Confucian upbringing of the Huizhou merchants, whose practical wit blended perfectly with a serene sense of elegance.

Most of the villages in the region are set in a north-south orientation, facing their water source and a mountain barrier to the rear. The whitewashed walls topped with grey tiles, the soaring tiered gables and the high enclosing walls are all typical features.

The courtyards are mostly surrounded by buildings in multiple, symmetric rows. Portraits of ancestors are hung in the main halls, together with paintings and calligraphies of renowned masters -- all very typical of the Confucian legacies of Huizhou. The courtyards adjoining the main halls are sources of light and ventilation. Rainwater is gathered and drained from these courtyards, taking on the propitious meaning of "all waters converge at the hall", denoting the accumulation of wealth and happiness. The ancestral halls, memorial archways and gardens too, are manifestations of the art of Huizhou architecture.

Decorative brick, stone and wood carvings, the renowned "Three carvings" of Huizhou traditional dwellings are focal features which add to the charms of its architecture. Such carvings are commonly seen on dwellings, ancestral halls and memorial archways, door canopies, columns, brackets, beams and window panels.

Apart from being pragmatic architectural components, the carvings provide details of aesthetic interest to the buildings. The subjects of the carvings varied from landscapes and folklores to the more popular historical anecdotes, scenes from folk operas and auspicious motifs, all part and parcel of the aesthetic and values of the Huizhou people.

To coincide with the exhibition, a fully illustrated catalogue will be available at the Gift Shop of the Heritage Museum.

Located at 1 Man Lam Road in Sha Tin, the Heritage Museum opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. It is closed on Tuesdays (except public holidays). Admission is $10, with a half-price concession for senior citizens aged 60 or above, people with disabilities and full-time students. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

A free shuttle bus operates between the Sha Tin KCR Station and the Heritage Museum from 10am to 6pm on Saturdays and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. From June 27 onwards, the shuttle bus will operate from 1pm to 6pm on Saturdays and from 1pm to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays.

Car parking is available at the Heritage Museum. Those who prefer to make use of public transport may take the KCR Ma On Shan line to the Che Kung Temple station, which is within five minutes' walk of the Museum.

For enquiries, call 2180 8188. For details of the exhibition, visit the Heritage Museum's website at http://hk.heritage.museum/.

Pan Asia Symphony Orchestra to perform double concertos
Thursday, April 21, 2005
Government Press Release

Violinist Ho Hong-ying, pianist Eva Lue and cellist Si-won Park will play with the Pan Asia Symphony Orchestra at concerts of "The Great Double Concertos" next month (May).

Under the baton of director Dr Yip Wai-hong, the orchestra will perform Mendelssohn 's "Overture to Fingal's Cave" and "Double Concerto for Violin and Piano in D Minor" as well as Brahms's "Double Concerto for Violin and Cello in A Minor, Op. 102".

Ho Hong-ying began to study violin at 7, entered the Central Conservatory of Beijing at 11 and earned her Master's degree from Julliard School of Music in 1990. Ho is currently teaching at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, St. Stephen's Girl's College and the Yip's Music Centre.

Hong Kong born pianist Eva Lue graduated from the Royal College of Music of London and won many awards including Hopkinson Gold Medal. Her recitals and radio broadcasts both as soloist and accompanist were critically acclaimed.

Korean cellist Si-won Park received her Bachelor's and Master's degree at The Juilliard School and The Manhattan School of Music under the tutelage of Paul Tobias, Myung Wha Chung. She won the Artist International Competition in 1997.

The orchestra, which aims to promote music among the general public especially the younger generation, has performed frequently in the Hong Kong City Hall, regional town halls and civic centres over the past 20 years. A number of internationally famous conductors and soloists have been invited to perform with it.

Presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, the concerts of "The Great Double Concertos" will be staged at 8pm on May 21 (Saturday) and May 22 (Sunday) at the Auditorium, Sha Tin Town Hall and Auditorium, Tsuen Wan Town Hall respectively.

Tickets priced at $100, $80 and $60 are now available at all URBTIX outlets. Half-price concessions will be granted to senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients. (Limited tickets for students and CSSA recipients available on a first-come, first-served basis.) A 10% discount applies to Friends of LCSD performing venues.

For programme enquiries, call 2268 7321; for ticketing enquiries and reservations, call 2734 9009; for credit card telephone bookings, call 2111 5999; for internet booking, visit www.urbtix.hk; for more information, visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp.

Box seats and lounge packages are available for sale for the performance, please call 2268 7237 for details.

Shanghai old jazz band to perform in June
Friday, April 29, 2005

One of the most famous and the only old jazz band in China today, the Shanghai Peace Hotel Old Jazz Band will give three concerts of golden melodies in June.

Featuring classics like "Stand by Me", "Besame Mucho", "What a Wonderful World" and "Moon River", the performances will be held at the Yuen Long Theatre on June 11 (Saturday), Kwai Tsing Theatre on June 12 (Sunday) and Sheung Wan Civic Centre on June 13 (Monday). All concerts will begin at 8pm.

Founded in 1980, the Shanghai Peace Hotel Old Jazz Band is made up of six veteran musicians whose careers span more than half a century and with an average age of 76. Two of them were former members of the first all-Chinese jazz band led by Jimmy King in the 1940s. The band was a crowd-puller at the Paramount, the favourite haunt of the fashionable Shanghainese in those days. Its repertoire consists mainly of jazz standards of the thirties and forties as well as some of pop's golden oldies. The revived band has made 27 overseas visits over the years and has performed for many celebrities and heads of states, including former US presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, and King Harald V of Norway.

The Concert by the Shanghai Peace Hotel Old Jazz Band is presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. Tickets ranging from $80 to $180 are now available at URBTIX outlets, while senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients may have 50% off (limited quotas for students and CSSA recipients on a first-come, first-served basis). A 10% discount applies to Friends of LCSD performing venues. There will also be group booking discounts: 10% for four to nine tickets, 15% for 10 to 19 tickets, 20% for 20 tickets or more.

For enquiries about the programme and a pre-concert talk, call 2268 7321 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp. Ticketing enquiries and reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Tickets can also be booked online at www.urbtix.hk.

International Museum Day Hong Kong to launch on May 14 and 15
Friday, April 29, 2005
Government Press Release

More than 30 museums and cultural institutions from Guangdong Province, Hong Kong and Macau will participate in the "International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" on May 14 and 15, organised by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD).

"International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" is in support of the International Museum Day first designated on May 18, 1978, by the International Council of Museums. It is being organised locally for the fifth time.

People will be able to visit 26 local museums and cultural institutions free of charge (except the Special Exhibition Hall of the Hong Kong Science Museum and the Stanley Ho Space Theatre of the Hong Kong Space Museum) and view more than 100 exhibitions. More than 200 programmes will also be organised for this special event.

Meanwhile, a Museum Panorama with a theme "Museums Bridging Cultures", will be held at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum at 1 Man Lam Road, Sha Tin during May 14 and 15. Open from 10am to 6pm daily, the two-day colorful Panorama will provide visitors with entertaining booth games and a series of educational activities.

The Museum Panorama contains three main parts -- Theatre Programme, Interactive Zone and Courtyard Carnival.

Theatre Programme will include several informative talks on Chinese medicine, health, Cantonese opera and architecture.

In Interactive Zone, workshops with interesting contents such as Chinese book binding method, model making of Mars globe, warship and museums and Chinese martial art will be organised.

Booths of 18 museums and cultural institutions from Guangdong Province, Macau and Hong Kong will be featured in the Courtyard Carnival. It will provide details of individual museum, their characteristics, services and activities.

The "Gems of Museums", to be held at the Thematic Gallery 3 and 4 at the Heritage Museum, is another highlight of this year's International Museum Day. Representative collections selected from more than 10 major local museums will be on display, giving visitors a glimpse of diversified collections of local museums.

To encourage more people to visit local museums frequently, visitors to the Museum Panorama will receive an "IMD Game Card" which enable them to take part in a game to be held from May 14 to August 31. Participants who bring along this game card and visit a participating museum or institution will get a stamp and receive a souvenir card. If 18 stamps are collected, participants can get an "International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" souvenir watch. The souvenirs are available for collection while stocks last.

Other programmes for International Museum Day include lectures on the work and functions of museums, demonstrations on art and traditional handicrafts, model making, children's programmes, free guided tours and behind-the-scenes tours.

This year, International Museum Day also sees the participation of museums and cultural institutions from Guangdong Province and Macau. Participating institutions include: Hong Kong Museum of History and its branches, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong Heritage Museum and its branches, Hong Kong Science Museum, Hong Kong Space Museum, Hong Kong Museum of Coastal Defence, Flagstaff House Museum of Tea Ware, Hong Kong Film Archive, Central Conservation Section under LCSD, Antiquities and Monuments Office, Art Promotion Office, Museum of Ethnology, Foods of Mankind Museum, Tung Wah Museum, Po Leung Kuk Museum, The Hong Kong Racing Museum, University Museum and Art Gallery of The University of Hong Kong, Art Museum of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Planning and Infrastructure Exhibition Gallery, Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences, Hong Kong Correctional Services Museum, Police Museum, Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, Guangzhou Municipal Bureau of Culture and The Museum of Macao.

Programme Booklets with details of the "International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" will be available at all participating Hong Kong institutions starting May 7. Information will also be available on the website at http://hk.heritage.museum/ starting May 7. For enquiries, please call 2180 8188.

Korean troupe to perform traditional songs and dances
Tuesday, May 3, 2005
Government Press Release

Hong Kong audiences will soon get a taste of the dynamic dance style of the Seoul Performing Arts Company from Korea.

Presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, "Dynamic Korea" will be presented at 8pm at the Auditorium of the Yuen Long Theatre on June 10 (Friday) and Shatin Town Hall on June 11 (Saturday).

The programme will feature a variety of traditional folk dances and songs, including "Taepyong-mu" and "Whagwan-mu", court dances of refined beauty; "Sword Dance", with its austere movements and captivating variations originating from ancient times; "Halyang-mu", an ethereal portrait of ancient scholars who lead a secluded life in the woods; "Ip-chum", an improvised and mirthful dance; "Saran-ga" (Love Duet), set to a traditional operatic song; the "Fan Dance", with its elegant movements complemented by magnificent costumes; and "Nong-ak", folk dances performed at festivals where people pray for good harvests, featuring the famous hourglass drum dance. The show reaches its climax with "Chilgo-mu" (Dance of Seven Drums): each dancer plays seven drums at the same time on a three-tier platform. The result is a dynamic spectacle, showcasing Korea's traditions of dance and music.

The Seoul Performing Arts Company was established in 1986, with the mission of revamping the traditional Korean performing arts and promoting the unique culture of Korea around the world. It has created many musicals and traditional Korean song and dance productions.

The group has toured over 42 countries including the United States, Germany, Spain, Japan, India and Brazil, staging about 800 performances, attracting over three million viewers at home and abroad. It performed at the closing and opening ceremonies of the Seoul Olympics 88, 99 Winter Asian Games, 2000 Korea Millennium Grand Gala and the promotional event for the World Cup 2001.

Tickets ranging from $90 to $160 are now available at URBTIX outlets, while senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients may have 50% off (limited quotas for students and CSSA recipients on a first-come, first-served basis). A 10% discount applies to Friends of LCSD performing venues. There will also be group booking discounts: 10% for four to nine tickets, 15% for 10 to 19 tickets, 20% for 20 tickets or more.

For enquiries about the programme and the workshop, call 2268 7323 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp. Ticketing enquiries and reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Tickets can also be booked online at www.urbtix.hk.

Hanging in the hood
A group of artists immersed themselves in Wan Chai life for a fortnight and they made fast friends and found fresh inspiration
5 May 2005
South China Morning Post

WAN CHAI'S ROLE as a cultural hub is open to debate. The district may be home to the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts and the Hong Kong Arts Centre, but once you've crossed Gloucester and Jaffe roads, you're more likely to see pole dancing than classical or contemporary displays. Moving further south towards Queen's Road East, you'll reach the culturally rich old Wan Chai, the fate of which is being threatened by redevelopment. Perhaps it's not the best place to breed creativity or inspiration. Or is it?

The Artists in Residence (AiR) Association, a non-profit-making organisation, tries to answer this question with an arts project and exhibition that promotes cultural exchange through residency programmes. Codenamed "re:wanchai", the project consists of 24 local and overseas artists immersing themselves in Wan Chai's culture for a fortnight. The participants have left their studios and integrated with the local community "to engage each other, to explore new ideas, and expand the boundaries of their practice".

The artists also went about their work, creating traditional art, photography, video and engraving, to installations and multimedia works such as Indian artist Nandabattlv Harsha's rice paintings.

Their works will be displayed on Saturday in a derelict building, specially christened the AiR Corner House, opposite the Wan Chai Market. The show will run until May 29, just days before the demolition of this old block, which the Urban Renewal Authority leased to AiR Association for this project. The artists' sole, non-political mission is to regenerate people's interest in the area.

One artist, Vietnamese photographer Dinh Q. Le, was inspired by a recent news report on a lack of space and opportunities for elderly gardeners. So, he created a rooftop garden in the old exhibition venue.

With the help of project partners St James' Settlement, a group of retirees was invited to grow their plants at AiR Corner House until the building is sealed off. These plants will then be given to the elderly, for free.

Installation artist Nindityo Adipurnomo, from Yogyakarta in Indonesia, hit the streets of Wan Chai for his piece, Do You Have Fun and Space for Alternative Thinking?

"I went out to talk to the people, and ask them to write on a board what was on their minds," he says. "Some wrote their names, some wrote their wishes, and one drew some mahjong tiles. Many said they weren't into art. So, I am going to make use of those drawings to illustrate the function of arts in Hong Kong."

Local mixed-media artist Leung Mee-ping says she's making a documentary about street-sleepers that explores their identity in the Wan Chai community.

"I have been filming them without letting them know," says Leung. "By now, I have been able to recognise quite a number of them. During the day, it seems they just keep walking, going nowhere. And no one seems to notice them either. But when we talk about community culture, this group of people should not be ignored."

The local residents are just as important to the project as the artists themselves, and some have cooked for their guests and been helpful in other ways, the project's organisers say. "Such a programme would not be successful if [the artists] failed to get insights of Wan Chai's changing faces from kaifongs [neighbourhood associations]," says AiR spokesman Howard Chan Pui-hoe. For instance, the "legendary tailor" on Lee Tung Street, Lee Yuk-lun, is a Wan Chai history book on legs. The 71-year-old has run his business in the neighbourhood for half a century. In the 1950s and 60s, Mr Lee's name was all but a fashion brand for the hostesses at Wan Chai clubs.

"I designed and made costumes for the girls at nightclubs in the Jaffe Road area," he says. "I was a dab hand at mini-skirts, see-through blouses, halter-neck pyjamas," says Lee.

He recalls the good, old days when he, and many big spenders, frequented nightclubs and bars and made clothes for their girls. "Behind those fancy neon signs, it was a wonderland," he says. "Wine flowed like water. I was often offered free drinks. Of course, there was no Suzie Wong, and I'm no Robert Lomax, either."

Another long-time resident Ng Kam-cheu, who has been taking the artists on cultural tours, explains why Queen's Road East is like a tunnel that can take people back in time. "About 150 years ago, it was the main thoroughfare for local fishermen," he says. "It used to be on the waterfront. From there, a small bay, or wan chai in Cantonese, led to the sea."

Cheung Hay-ming also volunteered to be a tour guide. The Correctional Services Department officer is so enamored by the district's charms that he recently moved there. He took the artists to the Hung Sing Temple (or Tai Wong Temple) because the ancient structure marks where the waterfront used to be.

During their two-week stay, the artists also learnt how Wan Chai is full of contradictions. While the alleys between Johnston Road and Queen's Road East house printing shops, cobblers and green grocers - where one can still catch a glimpse of the old way of life - several blocks away, Hopewell Holdings plans to turn the area between Ship Street and Hopewell Centre into a mega-hotel complex, a proposal that perplexes Adipurnomo.

"This is my first time in Hong Kong," he says. "Wan Chai is a dynamic place. Residents here are eager to keep it as an old and historical place while the government wants to see more modern buildings."

Fellow-artist Amy Cheung says the contrasts sum up the district's character. "Perhaps that is the real Wan Chai - a fusion of seemingly contradictory things, where the old converges with the new, where everything seems to be in transition," she says.

However, the past still lingers. The old Wan Chai Post Office has ceased to operate, yet locals relate the story of a ghost postman riding his bicycle on midnight deliveries. The tale inspired Seeman Ho, whose contribution will feature in the toilet (where ghost stories are traditionally told) at AiR Corner House. "It is the old stories and old things that have made Wan Chai a community, without which Wan Chai is only the name of a place on the map," says AiR Association spokesman Jaffa Lam. "We hope to bring back the soul of the old and true Wan Chai through the project."re:wanchai, AiR Corner House, 245 Queen's Rd East, Wan Chai. Opens Sat, noon-8pm. Inquiries: 8201 1500

Photo exhibition captures allure of Paris over last century
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Government Press Release

More than 160 black-and-white photographs selected from the Centre Pompidou will go on display tomorrow (May 11).

The exhibition, "Paris Reflections: Photographs from the Centre Pompidou", will run at the Hong Kong Museum of History until May 30, 2005.

Presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department and the Centre Pompidou of France, the exhibition is jointly organised by the Museum of History and the Consulate General of France in Hong Kong. It is also part of the programmes of "The Year of France in China" and "Le French May".

The exhibition was opened today by the Director of the Leisure and Cultural Services, Ms Anissa Wong Sean-yee; the President of the Centre Pompidou, Mr Bruno Racine; the Consul-General of France in Hong Kong, Mr Serge Mostura; and the Chief Curator of the Museum of History, Dr Joseph Ting Sun-pao.

The exhibition features more than 160 black-and-white photographs taken from the 1920s to the 1990s by 32 photographers. There are masterpieces of world-renowned artists, including Brassa?, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Man Ray, as well as artists recently discovered by the Centre Pompidou, such as Daniel Masclet, Eli Lotar and Tore Yngve Johnson.

Paris is presented in a variety of styles through street scenes, buildings, portraits and everyday life. The exhibition shows the city's grandeur as a modern cosmopolitan city as well as its uniqueness as a European city of a gentler era. Both long shots or close-ups, the images, with their poetic flavour and philosophical overtones, speak of the reality and romance of Paris in the last century. They also capture the mystique and allure of the city that has made a lasting impression.

The exhibits are divided into three parts. The first presents an extraordinary series of prints made between the two World Wars in the 1920s and 1930s. Photographers of this period were influenced by artistic movements such as Impressionism, Cubism and the Bauhaus. The economic crisis that took place in the 1930s also prompted them to face social and economic realities. Scenes of everyday life in the city became the popular subject in their photographs.

The second part covers the postwar period from the 1940s to 1970s, when photography entered the commercial age. Cameras shrank in size while printing techniques were much simplified and improved. Documentary photography as a genre came into being, and photo agencies became a new breed of business, especially in Paris. Exhibitions and publications of photographs proliferated, giving photographers the social status that used to be enjoyed by artists.

The third part features photographs taken in the 1980s and 1990s, when photography became a medium of artistic experimentation, and with it came a radical change in the perception of the relationship between the image and reality. Other emerging trends that had parallel influences to photography included conceptual, minimalist, documentary and filmic approaches.

Audiences will notice from the old photographs the subtle changes that have taken place in Paris over the last century.

The Hong Kong Museum of History is located at 100 Chatham Road South, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon. It opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. It is closed on Tuesday except public holidays. Admission is $10 and a half-price concession is available to full-time students, senior citizens and people with disabilities. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

For details, please visit the Museum of History's website at http://hk.history.museum or call 2724 9042.

Xi Opera to showcase 200 years of Jiangsu theatre
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
Government Press Release

The Xi Opera Troupe of Jiangsu will perform in the series, "Chinese Regional Opera of Jiangnan" next month (June) in Hong Kong.

Performances will feature the award-winning opera, "The Pearl Pagoda", and excerpts from Xi opera.

Xi Opera, or Wuxi Opera, is one of the most representative vernacular theatrical genres of Jiangsu. It originated from the banks of Taihu Lake in southern Jiangsu over 200 years ago. Its vernacular nature gives it a strong earthy touch, which is vivid and easy to understand.

"The Pearl Pagoda" won the Gold Award at the 7th Chinese Theatre Festival. The main cast, Ni Tongfang and Zhou Dongliang, National Class One performers of the troupe, are also winners of the Plum Blossom Award for Chinese Theatre. They will showcase the best of this unique Chinese opera genre. Excerpts to be staged are full of action and romance, complemented by martial arts and beautiful lyrics and tunes.

Presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, "The Pearl Pagoda" and Excerpts from the Opera will be staged at 7.30pm on June 21 (Tuesday) and 22 (Wednesday) separately at the Theatre, Hong Kong City Hall. Lyrics and dialogue will have Chinese and simplified English subtitles.

Tickets priced at $200, $150, $100 are now available at all URBTIX outlets. A group discount for the series, "Chinese Regional Opera of Jiangnan", is provided. For each purchase of 4-9 tickets: 10% off; 10-19 tickets: 15% off; 20 or more tickets: 20% off. Half-price concessions will be granted to senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients. For details about other discounts, please refer to the programme leaflet.

For programme enquiries, call 2268 7323; for ticketing enquiries and reservations, call 2734 9009; for credit card telephone bookings, call 2111 5999; for more information, visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp.

"Lu Opera Theatre of Hefei, Anhui" and "Wu Opera Troupe of Zhejiang" will also be invited to perform for the series "Chinese Regional Opera of Jiangnan" in July and August separately.

International Museum Day Hong Kong to bridge cultures
Saturday, May 14, 2005
Government Press Release

"International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong", organised by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD), begins this afternoon (May 14).

Under the theme of "Museum Bridging Cultures", around 70 museums and cultural institutes from Guangdong Province, Macau and Hong Kong are participating in the event.

The highlight programme of this event - Museum Panorama - held on the First Floor of the Hong Kong Heritage Museum, also started today.

Speaking at the opening ceremony for International Museum Day, the Secretary for Home Affairs, Dr Patrick Ho Chi-ping, said that while each country built up its own unique culture, museums allowed people to learn about the arts, history and culture of different places around the world.

"The education and entertainment functions of museums are getting more important in the 21st century. Therefore, we will continue to strengthen the service standards provided by local museums," Dr Ho said.

The two-day Panorama, open from 10am to 6pm daily, provides visitors with entertaining booth games and a series of educational activities. It contains three main parts - the Theatre Programme, Interactive Zone and Courtyard Carnival.

The Theatre Programme includes talks on Chinese medicine, health, Cantonese opera and architecture.

In the Interactive Zone, there will be workshops such as Chinese book-binding, model-making and Chinese martial arts.

Booths of 18 museums and cultural institutes from Guangdong Province, Macau and Hong Kong are featured in the Courtyard Carnival. Details of individual museums, their characteristics, services and activities will be showcased.

The exhibition, "Gems of Museums", held at the Thematic Galleries 3 and 4 at the Heritage Museum, is another highlight of this year's International Museum Day. Representative collections selected from major local museums are on display.

Apart from these activities, the public can visit 26 local museums and cultural institutes free of charge (except the Special Exhibition Hall of the Hong Kong Science Museum and the Stanley Ho Space Theatre of the Hong Kong Space Museum) and view more than 100 exhibitions. The Lei Cheng Uk Han Tomb Museum remains closed as renovation work is in progress.

More than 200 programmes are organised for this special event including lectures on the work and functions of museums, demonstrations on art and traditional handicrafts, model-making, children's programmes, free guided tours and behind-the-scenes tours.

To encourage more people to visit local museums, visitors to the Museum Panorama will receive an "IMD Game Card" which enables them to take part in a game from today until August 31. Participants who bring along this game card and visit a participating museum or institutes will get a stamp and receive a souvenir card. Upon the collection of 18 stamps, participants can get an "International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" souvenir watch. The souvenirs are available for collection while stocks last.

"International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong", being organised locally for the fifth time, is in support of International Museum Day first designated on May 18, 1978, by the International Council of Museums.

Participating cultural institutes include: Hong Kong Museum of History and its branches, Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong Heritage Museum and its branches, Hong Kong Science Museum, Hong Kong Space Museum, Hong Kong Museum of Coastal Defence, Flagstaff House Museum of Tea Ware, Hong Kong Film Archive, Central Conservation Section under LCSD, Antiquities and Monuments Office, Art Promotion Office, Museum of Ethnology, Foods of Mankind Museum, Tung Wah Museum, Po Leung Kuk Museum, The Hong Kong Racing Museum, University Museum and Art Gallery of The University of Hong Kong, Art Museum of The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Planning and Infrastructure Exhibition Gallery, Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences, Hong Kong Correctional Services Museum, Police Museum, Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, Guangzhou Municipal Bureau of Culture and The Museum of Macao.

Programme booklets with details of "International Museum Day 2005, Hong Kong" are available now at all participating Hong Kong institutes. Information is also available on the website, http://hk.heritage.museum/. For enquiries, please call 2180 8188.

CALL OF THE MALL
Art curators are learning how Hong Kong's shopping centres offer great venues and ready-made audiences for major exhibitions
17 May 2005
South China Morning Post

THE SUCCESS OF the exhibition of Picasso's massive Parade painting last year took no one by surprise - except the naysayers who claimed that Hongkongers didn't have a cultural bone in their bodies.

The treasure from the Pompidou Centre in Paris attracted two million people in the nearly three weeks it was here, prompting calls for more of the same. When a major exhibition of French Impressionist paintings came, art lovers turned out in force, making the show the second-most popular in the Museum of Art's history.

Although these shows proved there was a constituency for major art exhibitions here, they also highlighted a number of obstacles to bringing more. To begin with, where could they be shown, and - vitally - who would pay for them?

With only one suitably large art gallery and a scattering of smaller museums, one proposal has been to follow Parade's lead and make more of the spaces in which Hongkongers like to spend most of their time: shopping malls.

Picasso's magnificent 10.5-metre high, 16-metre wide stage curtain, created in 1917 for the opening of the ballet Parade, was so large that it was housed in one of the only places big enough to hold it, the towering atrium of Two IFC.

It wasn't the first exhibition to battle for attention with designer stores. Pacific Place and Taikoo Place have been hosting displays for years. But it did alert curators to the potential of shopping centres acting as art galleries.

"We've had to cancel many projects because of a lack of venues," says the French consul of culture and science, Michel Guyot, who for years has promoted French culture - and, in particular, art - as part of the annual Le French May festival. "I never thought about having an exhibition in a mall, but after three years here my answer now is, 'Why not?'"

Given Parade's reception, and the fact that Hong Kong showed it could replicate museum conditions in unorthodox venues, many speculated that the city would soon welcome other famous works.

But since the curtain fell on the Impressionists exhibition on April 10, art lovers have felt short-changed. Rumoured shows such as a touring retrospective of clothes by British designer Vivienne Westwood have fallen through. The Chinese host for the exhibition organised by London's prestigious Victoria and Albert Museum will be Shanghai, rather than the IFC.

Stephan Spurr, general manager of Swire Properties, which has funded public art in and around its properties for decades, says the Picasso buzz hasn't led to any "great artistic tsunami".

But David Dumigan, deputy general manager of projects at Henderson Land Development, one of the consortium members behind the IFC, says the success of Parade means there could be other high-end exhibitions as developers seek to mark themselves out from the crowd and please their tenants, who benefit from the extra shoppers. He says the IFC is talking to five museums in Europe and China. But with "no firm budget established for these things", it's unclear how the group plans to equal Parade's success.

"Hong Kong is a world-class city in terms of business and commerce, but it couldn't be considered world class in terms of art and culture, by any stretch of the imagination," says Dumigan. Companies have a responsibility to bring art to the boardwalk rather than the boardroom, he says.

Perhaps it's not surprising that Dumigan should extol the virtues of public art - Henderson is one of the companies jockeying for a position in the West Kowloon Cultural District arts hub.

Given the successful run for French artists - boosted by the Year of France in China and Hong Kong's annual Le French May - Guyot says he's now in talks to bring a major sculpture exhibition here.

Louis Yu Kwok-lit, executive director of the Hong Kong Arts Centre, says big names are crucial to public interest. "People went to see Parade, not because they'd heard it was a world-famous art work, but because Picasso is famous," he says. "Right now, there's a very good Tang dynasty exhibition, but it's not so sexy."

Yu says Hong Kong needs three or four high-profile exhibitions a season, as well as time in the school curriculum to allow teachers to educate students about art and take pupils to museums.

In the immediate future, he says, the success of Parade shows how canny curators and ambitious developers can capitalise on Hongkongers' love for a famous name and a day at the mall.

"I saw people waiting in line, and although it was a single work, I think it told us that Hong Kong people like to go to malls," Yu says. "In the short term, the Parade phenomenon showed us that the combination of a mall culture and good taste in art work and exhibitions generate a synergy we never expected."

Tim Li Man-wai, chairman of the ParaSite art space, an installation artist and an architect at the Housing Authority, says that exhibiting fine art in shopping malls fits with a culture in which parents have little free time to spend with their children, so a day out has to satisfy several needs.

"I've talked to some of the museum curators, and there's a demand from the public for museums to be more than a place to appreciate art," he says. "It needs to be a family day out and a place parents can take their kids."

Were we able to persuade the great galleries of the world to lend us their works, Li says the chance to see originals by artists such as Vincent Van Gogh and US sculptor Richard Serra - who constructs massive metal sculptures that would be perfect in an atrium - could spur a change in people's interest in art.

"Van Gogh would be on my list because Van Gogh is a name people know and to see the original is really inspiring," Li says.

But he's concerned that a consortium of businesses staged Parade at the same time as discussions were under way about the $40-billion West Kowloon project. "If a private company pays for an exhibition, it means it has to have some kind of commercial value, such as if it helps a developer to sell some kind of property," says Li. Hong Kong should emulate cities such as New York and develop its art through non-profit foundations, he says. When business gets involved, "it gets really complicated, because art becomes a kind of apparatus for money and power".

Public funding of the arts is a touchy subject. The government came under fire for spending $12 million on the Impressionists exhibition. Even though $7 million of that had been raised through sponsorship, the show took $5 million of the museum's $8 million exhibition budget.

For 2004-05, the Museum of Art received about $64 million in total government funding, a 25 per cent drop compared with 2002-03.

But with public spending on art under increasingly tight scrutiny in Hong Kong, it may be only big business that has deep enough pockets to fund major shows. For the foreseeable future, Hong Kong is in the strange situation of high-end art finding a place in shopping malls, too few independent art spaces and centrally run art institutions. Yu says that more could be made of the arts budget if less money were spent on the bureaucracy that administers public galleries. "People need to look carefully at government spending on art," he says. "How much goes on art work and how much on administration? We use a system which even a socialist country like China isn't using."

Governments in Europe often subsidise their premier art institutions, but they don't run them. Yu says Hong Kong is an anomaly and it needs to think about developing a culture that appreciates art for more than its monetary value and encourage autonomous art institutions to flourish through independent resources.

"Because Hong Kong is a cosmopolitan city, when people come here, it's not just to see Asian culture," Yu says. "We should play a role in showcasing world culture - this is the meaning of Asia's World City. People come here to buy things from all over the world. Why not come here to see art from all over the world?"

Exhibition shows impressions of China by French artists
Saturday, May 28, 2005
Government Press Release

About 40 valuable paintings recording 18th and 19th century impressions of the Chinese people, landscape and customs by French artists are currently being showcased at the Hong Kong Museum of Art until October 30.

The exhibition, "French Vision of China", featuring historical works selected from the museum's collection, was organised to coincide with the events of the "Year of France" in China in 2005. The oil paintings, watercolours and prints depicting picturesque scenes of Guangzhou, Macau and Hong Kong by the French artists who travelled to China are indicative of the cultural exchanges that took place between France and China over the last three centuries.

Examples of Chinese export goods including silverware, lacquer ware and carving in ivory and tortoise shell are also displayed to illustrate items that were popular in the French market.

The star exhibit is a set of 16 engravings that show Emperor Qianlong's victories in Xinjing. It is a unique example of artistic confluence: the pictures were designed by Western painters in Beijing, while the copperplates were engraved and the printing executed in France.

The earliest official contact between France and China was made in the 17th century, during the late Ming (1368-1644) to early Qing dynasty (1644-1911). When Louis XIV (1643-1715) ascended the throne, he sought active measures to promote missionary activities and to expand overseas trade in the Far East. The first expedition to China arrived in Beijing in 1688. Many of the missionaries were Jesuits who were learned mathematicians and scientists.

The missionaries were well received by the Chinese court because of their great knowledge and skills. In particular, the emperors Kangxi (who ruled from 1662-1722) and Qianlong (who ruled from 1736-1795) welcomed their skills and put then to service. Hence Western science and technology including astronomy, geography, calendar, and various art forms were introduced during those periods.

Matteo Ripa (1682-1743), an Italian missionary who served at the court during the later part of Kangxi's reign, showed the emperor works of copper engravings. Kangxi then ordered a set of engravings to be made depicting 36 different aspects of the scenery of the Summer Palace in Chengde. He also commanded the making of the map of the Chinese Empire, "The Royal General Map". His grandson, Emperor Qianlong, further commissioned his military victories to be recorded in this same medium. And a number of missionary painters, who worked at the court during the Qianlong period, excelled in oil painting and often made portraits for the emperor.

The political contacts also promoted trading activities. The French East India Company was established in 1664, chartered by Louis XIV and planned by his prime minister Jean Baptiste Colbert (1661-1683). The first French merchant ship "Amphitrite" arrived in Guangzhou in 1698.

The 19th century was an age of exploration and expansion in France. In this spirit, a number of French artists travelled to China, either as official artists of the French fleet or as individual travellers. They recorded their impressions in their sketches and paintings, and some published them after they returned to France.

China became a land of mystery and beauty in the Western imagination. Artists who never visited China were inspired by records of those who did. Drawing on export goods from the East such as paintings, ceramics and silk textiles, they were inspired to create impressions of the people and landscape.

The French artists looked with a foreigner's eye at the people, the landscape and customs, and recorded the exotic, the curious, the aesthetic, and the inspiring with their sketches, watercolours, oil and prints. Complementing visual images with notes and diaries, these records reflect the artists’ personal experiences.

The Museum of Art is located at 10 Salisbury Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon. It opens from 10am to 6pm daily and is closed on Thursdays (except those falling on public holidays). Admission is $10 and a half-price concession is available to full-time students, senior citizens and people with disabilities. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

For enquiries, call 2721 0116 or visit the Museum of Art's website, http://hk.art.museum/.

"Nomade -- At Night, the Sky is Endless" to open International Arts Carnival
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Government Press Release

A treat for the senses! "Nomade -- At Night, the Sky is Endless", the latest creation of Cirque loize, invites you to a surreal journey along the highways and byways of their imagination.

Running from July 8 to 10 at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, the Asia premiere of "Nomade" opens this summer's "International Arts Carnival" (IAC) presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department.

The Journal de Montreal acclaimed "Nomade" as: "Exceptional and awesome! A dream world where sensuality, tenderness, humour and yes, emotion blend perfectly with acrobatics, daring and surprises."

Inspired by the wandering spirit and traditional folklore of the gypsies, "Nomade" is a nighttime carnival filled with a unique blend of acrobatics, aerialists, comic timing and infectious music. The journey begins at dusk and ends at dawn because at nighttime, the sky shines with endless possibilities. This treat for the senses features a cast of colourful characters and spotlights the amazing virtuosity of circus artists in peak form.

The circus performers of Cirque loize are modern-day nomads as they wander the globe. The troupe has performed for more than two million spectators in more than 200 cities and 20 countries.

Cirque loize, since its inception in 1993, has been a leading force in Quebec's thriving "Cirque Nouveau" movement that focused on innovation and imagination. This troupe of skilled acrobats and athletic dancers perform a magical brand of circus artistry that draws on the big-top tradition - and yet is entirely original.

"Nomade" will be performed at 7.30pm on July 8 and 9; and at 3pm on July 9 and 10 at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Grand Theatre.

Tickets priced at $120, $180, $250 and $320 are available at URBTIX outlets. Half-price tickets are available for full-time students, senior citizens, people with disabilities and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients. Package booking discounts are up to 15% for full-price tickets.

Programme guides are available at URBTIX outlets or at the website, www.hkiac.gov.hk

For programme enquiries, call 2370 1044. Telephone reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Internet bookings can be made at www.urbtix.hk

Boost for HK filmmakers at Venice festival
Vivienne Chow
28 August 2005
South China Morning Post

Two Hong Kong directors whose movies will open and close the Venice International Film Festival will receive a government grant to promote their works at the event, which starts on Wednesday.

Tsui Hark, director of martial arts epic Seven Swords, and Peter Chan Ho-sun's musical Perhaps Love will together receive about $500,000 from the Arts Development Fund, a Home Affairs Bureau spokesman said. Seven Swords will open the festival and Perhaps Love will be shown at the end.

The spokesman said that in the past, the Film Development Fund had subsidised the promotion of Hong Kong movies participating at international festivals.

"But since the Film Development Fund [was wound up last year], under such special circumstances, we especially arranged the Arts Development Fund for these two projects," said the spokesman.

The 62nd Venice International Film Festival is one of the world's prestigious festivals alongside the Cannes and Berlin events. It will be the first time that Hong Kong films will open and close a film festival of this scale.

Apart from the Hark and Chan movies, the festival will feature two other films by Hong Kong directors.

Stanley Kwan Kam-pang's drama Everlasting Regret, starring Sammi Cheng Sau-man, will represent Hong Kong in the festival's top award, the Golden Lion. Initial D by Andrew Lau Wai-keung and Alan Mak Siu-fai, a screen adaptation of a hit Japanese comic of the same name, will be screened in the out-of-competition section.

At a reception held yesterday to celebrate Hong Kong's role in the festival, Financial Secretary Henry Tang Ying-yen said it had high historical significance.

"This is the first time we have films by Hong Kong directors opening and closing one of the major film festivals in Europe. The world has recognised Hong Kong film professionals' hard work," Mr Tang said. "These four films to be shown {hellip} are co-productions between Hong Kong and the mainland. This shows that such co-operation in technique, capital and talent helps improve the competitiveness of Hong Kong films."

John Chong Ching - of Media Asia Entertainment Group, which produced Initial D - said: "Two months ago, nobody knew there would be four films by Hong Kong directors shown at Venice ... It's very good the government could react to this phenomenon within such a short time."

Hong Kong films hope for splash at Venice Film Festival
Tue Aug 30, 3:12 PM ET

HONG KONG (AFP) - Hong Kong films hope to make a splash at this year's Venice Film Festival with local movies opening and closing the prestigious event for the first time.

Director Tsui Hark's martial arts epic "Seven Swords" will be the curtain raiser at the 62nd edition of the festival on Wednesday, while Peter Chan Ho-sun's "Perhaps Love," the first Chinese musical in 40 years, will close it.

Two other films from the southern Chinese enclave will also be featured at Venice, the world's oldest international film festival and, along with Cannes and Berlin, one of the most glamorous.

"This is the first time that Hong Kong films have been selected to close and open one of the major film festivals in Europe," the territory's Financial Secretary Henry Tang said.

"Hong Kong movies have been recognised by the international industry. This is the result of the hard work contributed by the local film workers," he said last week at a celebration of the city's role in the annual event.

This boost comes at a time when the Chinese territory is struggling to revive an industry that was the third-largest producer of films in the 1980s after India's Bollywood studios and Hollywood.

It saw more than 300 films roll from its studios but 80 percent of its workforce has since been lost due to the Asian financial crisis and rampant piracy. Last year, barely 60 films were made.

The festival's decision to open and close with the two films prompted the government to grant the two directors each 300,000 Hong Kong dollars (38,500 US dollars) to promote their works in Venice.

"We are glad that Hong Kong films are being honoured in this first-class festival," a government spokeswoman said.

Set in 17th-century China not long after the Manchurians took control from the Qing dynastic rulers, "Seven Swords" follows seven martial arts masters who struggle to keep their art alive in the face of a government purge.

The film, which cost 18 million US dollars to make, has taken more than 100 million Hong Kong dollars (12.8 million US dollars) at the box office in China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong since it was released on July 29.

Rights for the film have also been sold to most European countries including France, Germany, Italy and Britain.

In contrast to the standard gangster or kung-fu fare that have traditionally dominated Hong Kong cinema, Chan's "Perhaps Love" is a story framed within a romantic triangle set during the making of a Chinese musical.

A collaboration with Andre Morgan, producer of Oscar-winning boxing drama "Million Dollar Baby", the 10 million US dollar film is set in the sleazy Shanghai of the 1930s and in modern-day China.

It brings together Asian star Takeshi Kaneshiro and mainland Chinese actress Zhou Xun. Farah Khan, of "Bombay Dreams" fame, is in charge of choreography.

Another Hong Kong drama, "Everlasting Regret" by director Stanley Kwan, will also compete for the festival's top Golden Lion award.

Kwan's "Centre Stage" won starlet Maggie Cheung the Best Actress award at the 1992 Berlin Film Festival.

"Initial D" by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak, a screen adaptation of a hit Japanese comic of the same name, will be screened in the out-of-competition section of the festival.

Lau, best known for directing the cop-thriller "Infernal Affairs" that has been remade by Martin Scorsese, is set to make his Hollywood debut with an independent thriller starring Richard Gere.

HK filmmakers urged to look beyond Hollywood
Vivienne Chow in Venice
4 September 2005
South China Morning Post

Taking over Hollywood is not a target of Hong Kong filmmakers, says internationally acclaimed director John Woo.

"Hollywood isn't the only [kind of cinema], and it isn't the best. There is no need for us filmmakers to have such an ambition," said Woo, who was invited to present the 62nd Venice Film Festival's "Secret History of Asian Cinema" programme on Friday night.

"It's difficult to say what the future of Chinese cinema will be like, but I believe that the creativity [of films] will improve drastically."

The Secret History of Asian Cinema paid tribute to Chinese cinema, which is celebrating its centenary this year. It showcased restored Chinese classics from the mid-1930s to 1990, including Fei Mu's Spring in the Small Town (1947), widely recognised as the best classical Chinese film. The project was co-presented by Fondazione Prada.

Woo hoped that the restored Chinese classics could further cultural exchanges between China and Italy.

"I'm very grateful and moved by this project," said Woo. "Chinese films from the 30s and 40s had traces of the neo-realism of Italian cinema. From these Chinese classics we can learn about people's lives in those days."

Woo said of the 15 Chinese classics to be shown, Fei's was one of his favourites.

"I've seen it two to three times. The film was very well made with a lot of symbolic meanings. It was not just about the reconstruction of a city after the war, but also able to redefine inter-personal relationships."

Guests turning up for Friday night's evening cocktail included mainland director Zhang Yuan, whose film Mama (1990) will be shown as part of the programme. Icelandic diva Bjork, in Venice for her new film Drawing Restraint 9, made a surprising appearance in a flamboyant costume. Woo's daughter, Angeles Woo, whose short film The Glass Beads is competing in the short film section, was among the guests.

Asian artists shone at this year's festival, with South Korean superstar Lee Young-ae and director Park Chan-wook, in Venice for their new film Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, which is in the race for the festival's top award, the Golden Lion.

Lee, best known in Asia for her popular TV series Jewel in the Palace, said that the previous night's press screening of the film had received positive comments.

"I can't say this is my greatest performance, but I certainly did my best," said Lee. "I've never thought of attending such major international events. To win anything is just a bonus."

Pamela Bienzobas, a jury member of the International Federation of Film Critics said that Lee's acting was extraordinary.

Park, director of violent feature Oldboy, which won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival last year, said that an American remake of his feature was in the works.

World renowned Berliner Philharmoniker to make Hong Kong debut
Monday, September 5, 2005
Government Press Release

The world-renowned Berliner Philharmoniker, with over 120 years of history, will make its first appearance in Hong Kong in November.

The orchestra, under the baton of Chief Conductor Simon Rattle, will perform Berlioz's "Overture Le Corsaire", Ravel's "Ma mere l'oye" and Beethoven's "Symphony No. 3 in E-flat, Op. 55, 'Eroica'" in the first concert, while featuring Haydn's "Symphony No. 86 in D", Ades' "Asyla" and Richard Strauss' "Ein Heldenleben" in the second.

Established in 1882, the Berliner Philharmoniker has been shaped artistically by the leadership of a series of distinguished conductors, from the founder, Franz Wullner, to the great violinist, Joseph Joachim, the conductor and pianist Hans von Bulow, Arthur Nikisch, Wilhelm Furtwangler, Herbert von Karajan and Claudio Abbado. Through its tours abroad - started in the Furtwangler era - and its numerous recordings, many of which are regarded as classic and benchmark recordings, the orchestra has established an international reputation as one of the finest in the world, an heir to the Austro-German orchestral tradition.

Simon Rattle was born in Liverpool in 1955 and, after studying at the Royal Academy of Music, won the 1974 John Player International Conducting Competition. He subsequently held a number of guest titles, including Principal Guest Conductor of the Rotterdam and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestras. In 1980, he was appointed Principal Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, and in 1990 became its Music Director until 1998. His performances and recordings with this orchestra won him world acclaim and many record awards. In 2002, he was elected by members of the Berliner Philharmoniker as the orchestra's Artistic Director and Chief Conductor and he brings to the orchestra a whole host of innovations.

Presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) and sponsored by Lee & Man Paper Manufacturing Limited and the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, the two concerts will be held at 8pm on November 13 and 14 (Sunday and Monday) at the Concert Hall, Hong Kong Cultural Centre.

Tickets priced from $300 to $2,500 are available from September 13 onwards at all URBTIX outlets. Half-price tickets are available for senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients. (Limited tickets for students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients are available on a first-come, first-served basis.) A 10% discount applies to Friends of LCSD performance venues.

For programme enquiries, call 2268 7321; for ticketing enquiries and reservations, call 2734 9009 (from September 14 onwards); for credit card telephone bookings, call 2111 5999 (from September 13 onwards); for internet bookings, visit www.urbtix.hk (from September 14 onwards); for more information, visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp.

Hong Kong Actors Finding Their Way Home
By MIN LEE, Associated Press Writer
Sept. 8, 2005

HONG KONG - After making their name in Hong Kong, Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Chow Yun-fat and John Woo all made the leap to Hollywood.

But Hong Kong's top actors and directors are now either returning home for projects or seeking inspiration from their cultural roots, with some citing creative restrictions and cultural differences in the United States.

Chan has been prolific in America but he still films movies in Hong Kong. He's slated to appear in the upcoming Ann Hui film "My Aunt's Postmodern Life" and plans to collaborate with famed Chinese director Zhang Yimou in an adaptation of a Chinese play.

Woo is planning "Battle of Red Cliff," a joint Sino-U.S. production about an ancient Chinese battle. Li's upcoming movie "Fearless" tells the story of Chinese kung fu master Huo Yuanjia.

Chan said he's well-paid but artistically unfulfilled in Hollywood.

"I make a lot of money in the U.S., but I can't make films I like," he said during a recent interview with The Associated Press.

Hollywood movies are so costly that they seldom take creative risks, and that's why his U.S. films are so similar in genre, he explained.

Chan's Hollywood movies haven't veered from the formula of interracial action comedy, a genre he's excelled in with
Chris Tucker in the "Rush Hour" series and with
Owen Wilson in the 2000 "Shanghai Noon" and "Shanghai Knights" in 2003.

But his Hong Kong productions are more diverse. He plays a tragic hero in "New Police Story" in 2004. Chan's new film "The Myth," tracks the journey of man who seeks his lost love from a previous life.

The same trend is seen in other Hong Kong talents who moved on to Hollywood.

Chow has reprised the role of gun-toting hero repeatedly, in U.S. movies like "The Replacement Killers" in 1998 and "The Corruptor" in 1999. But before he left for Hollywood his body of work included romance and comedy.

Chan noted that Hong Kong actors' roles are inherently limited because of their poor English.

"Today when our actors go to the U.S., what movies can they make? Can they appear in `Titanic?' Could they do `Kramer vs. Kramer'? No. No actor could do it," Chan said.

Veteran Hong Kong director Tsui Hark says Chinese actors simply aren't convincing in Western roles.

"They can't be viewed as Americans," he said.

But Tsui thinks Hong Kong's entertainers have already surpassed expectations in Hollywood.

"Be it Chow Yun-fat, Jet Li or Jackie Chan, the proportion of dialogue and drama in their movies is heavy. They use their dialogue to show their acting skills a lot," Tsui said.

Indeed, the Hong Kong actors have broken new cinematic ground, especially when it comes to interracial collaboration.

Other than the Chan-Tucker and Chan-Wilson comedy duos, Jet Li and late pop singer Aaliyah starred in 2000's "Romeo Must Die," a modern telling of "Romeo and Juliet." He also appeared in "Cradle 2 the Grave" in 2003 with hip-hop star DMX.

Chow's roles haven't all been one-dimensional. In the 1999 remake "Anna and the King," he played an authoritative Thai king who grew fond of his children's private tutor, played by
Jodie Foster.

And Chow's biggest U.S. hit by far is a kung fu movie in 2000 directed by Taiwan's Ang Lee. "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" netted four Oscars and became the most popular foreign film in U.S. history.

While Hollywood's Hong Kong stars are signing up for projects back home, they aren't abandoning their U.S. careers altogether.

Chan has maintained his profile in America with a steady stream of U.S. movies. Woo's production company Lion Rock Productions is based in Los Angeles. Chow will start work on the third installment of "Pirates of the Caribbean" later this year.

Director Stanley Tong is a rarity in that he relocated back to Hong Kong after a brief stint in Hollywood, where he shot the 1997 comedy "Mr. Magoo" and the TV series "Martial Law."

While the prestige of working in Hollywood is tempting, Tong said he likes working in his own culture better.

"I don't like living abroad and I really like my own Chinese culture," he said.

Hong Kong director unleashes passion through musical
Sat Sep 10, 1:31 PM ET

HONG KONG (AFP) - In a city famous for action movies, Hong Kong director Peter Chan Ho-sun has forged his own path to success, winning acclaim for his emotional, heart-wrenching and occasionally blood-curdling tales.

Even by his own standards, however, the renowned story teller's latest project was probably his biggest gamble yet -- making the first Chinese musical in four decades, entitled "Perhaps Love".

But the film, a love story that switches between 1930s and modern China, is one of the year's most hotly anticipated Asian films, having been chosen to close the prestigious Venice Film Festival on Saturday.

Festival director Marco Muller watched just 40 minutes of a then unfinished movie before inviting Chan to close the ceremony, and the director has since been rushing to ready the final cut for its world premiere.

"I thought what topic would be fresh and exciting? I was looking for some stimulant," says Chan, whose cast showcases a plethora of talent from several Asian countries.

"I have never liked technical things very much; I always shy away from many genres: action and special effects," he told AFP in an interview.

"I'd rather go for story telling. But I have to find a new way to tell a story instead of just straight narrative."

So the 42-year-old director chose to make a musical set in China, something that hasn't been done for almost as long as he's lived.

"To me, music is almost like alcohol, it gets you intoxicated in a way and you want to make a love story it takes emotion and passion to a higher level," he says.

Chan felt the need to help Chinese audiences unleash their suppressed emotions.

"Music brings out the unspoken (things) ... because Chinese are a lot more subtle and a lot more introverted," he says.

"Music helps you to express what you normally wouldn't express in your real life. I thought that would be very good for me as a medium to express a relationship or love story."

The Mandarin-language "Perhaps Love" tells the story of a film director and actor, played by Hong Kong veteran singer and screen star Jacky Cheung, who is making a musical that is set in 1930s China and caught in a love triangle.

The lead character is starring in his own musical along with his wife, played by Chinese actress Zhou Xun, and her ex-lover played by Taiwan-born
Takeshi Kaneshiro.

If it sounds as if there may be an autobiographical element, Chan confesses Cheung's character goes through the same anxieties he himself did while making a musical.

"I actually threw in a lot of my anxiety in the last two years in this character. A lot of the time the characters are playing what we were experiencing," he said.

"So it's actually like three movies. It makes it all much more fun and personal for everyone involved."

-- 'We are not making a concert' --

Cheung's character also has to deal with the dramatic commercialism that is sweeping the country, something else Chan has had to consider with "Perhaps Love" marking his first film to target a mainland Chinese audience.

"Cheung plays a typical mainland director facing the world of commercial cinema crashing in on him that he needs to deal with not only his artistic integrity but the world of commercialism," says Chan.

Shot in Shanghai and Beijing, the 10 million US dollar film brings together some of Asia's biggest talents: it is narrated by South Korean superstar, Ji Jin-hee; Bollywood's Farah Khan ("Bombay Dreams") was in charge of choreography; and veteran Hong Kong composers Peter Kam and Leon Ko wrote the score.

Chan stresses that "Perhaps Love" is not a musical in the Hollywood tradition of "Moulin Rouge" or "Chicago" where actors may burst into song at any moment.

The actors only sing when the camera starts rolling for the musical Cheung is making in the movie.

"We are not making a concert, this is not a stage musical," says Chan.

Though few of the cast were trained singers or dancers, Chan says: "As long as they are good actors, I thought they would do well."

Chan's breakout movie was also a romance. "Comrades, Almost a Love Story" won him nine awards at the 1996 Hong Kong Film Awards, including the best picture and best director.

Three years later he made his Hollywood debut, "The Love Letter", with the help of Andre Morgan, his current film partner and producer of Oscar-winning boxing drama "Million Dollar Baby".

But he has avoided the production line ethos of the prolific Hong Kong movie industry, choosing projects at his own leisurely pace while helping new talent on to the screen.

His production credits include horror-flick "The Eye" by the Pang brothers which is being remade by Tom Cruise's Cruise Wagner Productions and Paramount Pictures.

But Chan's own foray into Hollywood led him to discover that the way of moviemaking there wasn't for him.

"Directors are not the reasons people make movies, the reason they make movies because of the studio machine, because they are profitable," he laments.

"In Asia, the director is usually the only reason why people make a movie because the director goes out and secures the finance and tries to put a film together.

"Being the control freak that I am, I don't feel very comfortable working in a system where there is a whole big grand piece and then I'm just part of it," he says.

"A movie is not completed overnight. a movie needs to be nurtured for two to three years ... You need to be with it every step of the way like pregnancy. You cannot have another woman to bear your child."

The family analogy is apt for Chan, who followed the footsteps of his father into the movie business.

"I just love making movies and my father was making movies. He wasn't as successful as he wanted to be so I wanted to make sure I could finish off what he started," Chan says.

Plain sailing
A new private museum celebrating Hong Kong's maritime culture opened last week.
11 September 2005
South China Morning Post

MURRAY HOUSE IS a something of a museum piece in itself. But the 151-year-old building at Stanley has just taken on even greater historical significance, becoming home to the city's fourth private museum.

The Hong Kong Maritime Museum, which opened on Friday on the ground floor of Murray House, is expected to bolster the standing of Hong Kong's private museums. The other three - the Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences in Mid-Levels, the Museum of Ethnology in Tai Po Kau and the Hong Kong Racing Museum in Happy Valley - have long struggled to attract the sort of support on which counterparts in cities such as New York and London rely.

Inside the 5,000sqft museum, models of junks and ships, paintings, maps and other maritime artefacts are packed into air-conditioned, softly lit galleries.

The museum focuses on the development of shipping in ancient China and in Hong Kong from the mid-19th century onwards. According to director Stephen Davies, the reason it confines itself to commercial shipping and doesn't encompass naval history (a subject touched on by the Museum of Coastal Defence) is to "stay ideologically correct".

"We move from the story of China, about their building of junks before the 20th century, to commercial shipping to avoid the period where the coming of western fleets posed threats and humiliation to the Chinese nation," says Davies.

The museum is divided into two exhibition halls: the Ancient Gallery, which details early sea voyages in China; and the Modern Gallery, which showcases vessels used by shipping companies operating in Hong Kong. Models on display range from a pottery boat made in the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD25 to 220) to a 564,763 tonne crude oil carrier, the ocean-going version of which is 458 metres long.

The mastermind behind the project is 66-year-old Anthony Hardy, a former chairman of Wallem Shipping and a Hong Kong resident for 22 years. "Hong Kong definitely deserves its own maritime museum because it's such a prominent shipping port," he says. "When you look at the origin and history of Hong Kong it always revolves around the sea."

Davies, who grew up near the sea in England and had 15 years of sailing experience before setting foot in Hong Kong, says the museum will preserve the collective memory of Hong Kong. "You can't separate Hong Kong's history from the sea, he says. "Even now, more than 95 per cent of the trade in Hong Kong goes by sea. People know little about Victoria Harbour - although they know how to pass under it."

Hardy's dream of educating people about the affairs of the sea was easier than many had expected. Two years ago, he and some like-minded allies managed to raise $25 million within a few weeks from 65 donors. Most were shipping enterprises with operations in Hong Kong.

Hardy then applied to base the museum in Murray House, which belongs to the Housing Authority. Approval was quickly obtained - the government "loves the idea", says Hardy - and rent was set at a nominal value under a six-year contract.

Hong Kong tycoons tend to lavish donations on schools and universities, so it was a surprise to see them get behind a cultural project such as this. The donors' list includes Cosco Shipping, Hutchison Port Holdings and Orient Overseas (International) (OOIL), which is run by the family of former chief executive Tung Chee-hwa.

Hardy says it wasn't hard to secure funds for the museum. When he approached shipping companies with the idea, "nobody said it was a bad one", he says. "I guess everyone has their pet when it comes to donations. Some may like doing charity in this way or that, but some like the idea of sponsoring a museum. And our museum is one that tells their story."

OOIL spokesman Stanley Shen says the company donated a substantial amount of money and some exhibits, including a model of a typical Hong Kong port. "The museum is long overdue because the development of Hong Kong trade and commerce is totally inseparable from maritime affairs," he says. "As a major maritime company in Hong Kong, we feel it's right for us to show our support.

"The responsibility of sustaining the museum rests with society as a whole, but our company would definitely be present if there were any need to organise a fund-raising campaign."

Gaining public exposure may be sufficient motivation for major companies to continue supporting the museum, but the city's other private museums can't rely on such generous support from the private sector.

PricewaterhouseCoopers partner Florence Yip Kwai-fong says that, although donating to a private museum with a recognised trust is regarded as charity under Hong Kong tax laws (allowing donors a tax write-off), few Hongkongers choose to do so.

"In western countries, museum culture has reached a more sophisticated stage where there's a respect for those who have taste and knowledge of fine and precious things," she says. "It's not only about whether you're rich enough to support the museum. In those countries, curators earn as much respect from the people as university heads do. But in Hong Kong, people don't tend to appreciate local museums or their curators in this way."

Yip says that, although some tycoons have personal collections of antiques or other valuable objects, they'd rather display them at overseas museums than fund a private one here.

"When you're talking about setting up a museum and showing collections, it means you need to pay people to maintain, catalogue and arrange them. And security costs have to be covered as well. That all adds up to a lot of money - but it's very likely, in the end, that you won't gain much appreciation from people [in Hong Kong]," she says.

"But I know that some people who own priceless pieces show them in museums in Europe, or even Shanghai, because they think the audiences there are of a better class."

Given how other private museums are faring financially, Hardy is fully aware of the potentially choppy waters ahead. He hopes to keep people coming back by changing displays regularly and securing worthy items, even if the cost is high.

"The advantage of working in a private museum is that you can act promptly," he says. "In government-sponsored ones, the treasure goes into someone else's hands while you're filling in the forms. But we have total flexibility. Our acquisition team can exercise discretion to buy an item within one hour, even if it means the price may exceed our expectation."

But Davies and Hardy aren't worried at this stage. "We're fascinated by the sea and it will continue to be a fascinating subject," says Davies. "Our museum will try its best to grasp the imagination of children and adults alike."

Maritime Museum, G/F Murray House, Stanley Plaza, Stanley, $20 ($10), Sun and public holidays, Tue to Fri 10am to 6pm, Sat 10am to 7pm (closed Mon). Inquiries: 2813 2822

Relics from Pearl River Delta Region on display tomorrow
Government Press Release
Thursday, September 29, 2005

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About 160 cultural relics from Guangdong, Macau and Hong Kong will go on display at the Hong Kong Museum of History from tomorrow (September 30) to January 2, 2006, highlighting the important roles these three cities have played in the past 2,000 years of Sino-Western exchanges.

The exhibition, "East Meets West - Cultural Relics from the Pearl River Delta Region", is jointly presented by the Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, the Guangzhou Municipal Cultural Bureau, the Home Affairs Bureau of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Macao Special Administrative Region Government. It is co-organised by the Hong Kong Museum of History, the Guangzhou Museum, the Guangzhou Museum of Art, the Guangdong Provincial Museum and the Museum of Macao.

Speaking today (September 29) at the opening ceremony of the exhibition, the Secretary for Home Affairs, Dr Patrick Ho Chi-ping, stressed that meetings held in Hong Kong, Macau, Guangzhou and Dongguan had formalised a channel for the exchange of views and the sharing of experiences among museum professionals and the exhibition fully displayed the professional spirits and close museum collaboration in the Pearl River Delta region.

"The trio of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau has long been a link between China and the Western world for commercial and cultural exchanges. The maritime trade of the South China Sea with Guangzhou as its originating port connected Asia with Europe some 2,000 years ago. Hong Kong and Macau, which are strategically situated near the Pearl River Estuary, have guarded the waterway to Guangzhou, and have also prospered in different periods," he said.

"The exhibition, through the design of export wares, the spread of Christianity, the introduction of scientific knowledge, the materialisation of cultural ferment and the rise of a new intelligentsia, introduces the specific roles that the trio played in the history of Sino-Western exchanges," Dr Ho said.

The artifacts will be transferred to Guangzhou and Macau for display when the exhibition ends next January.

Other officiating guests at the opening ceremony were the Deputy Director of Guangdong Provincial Department of Culture, Mr Jing Lihu; Director of Guangzhou Municipal Cultural Bureau, Mr Tao Cheng; President of Cultural Affairs Bureau, Macao SAR Government; Ms Heidi Ho; and the Chief Curator of the Hong Kong Museum of History, Dr Joseph Ting Sun-pao.

The foreign trade of Guangdong came into its own in the Qin and Han Dynasties (221BC-AD220), grew in importance in the Jin and the Southern and Northern Dynasties period (265-581), and reached the peak of its development from the Tang to Qing Dynasties (618-1911). Hong Kong and Macau, situated strategically near the Pearl River Estuary, guarded the waterway to Guangzhou and prospered in different periods.

The maritime route - one that linked China with Southeast Asia, the Indian sub-continent, the Middle East and eastern Africa, which has come to be known as the "Maritime Silk Route" or the "Porcelain Route", played an important role in overseas communication, commercial contact and cultural exchanges between East and West.

The roles of the three cities in the East-West cultural exchanges since the early 17th century via the Maritime Silk Route are explicit in the design of export commodities, the introduction of scientific knowledge, the cultural ferment on daily life, the exchange of arts and crafts, and the rise of a new intelligentsia in China.

On the domains of export commodities, the Western elements had successfully integrated into the artistic styles and decorative patterns of China's paintings, enamel ware, furniture, embroideries and ivory carvings. The translated works and maps of the missionary opened a new world of knowledge to the Chinese as they learned of the calendric system, astronomy and geography. The Cantonese people were quick to absorb Western elements, as evidenced by their everyday use of glasses, binoculars, watches, hand-rolled cigarettes, sweet potatoes and Western dress.

Western building technology and design are still evident in the historic structures of more than 100 years ago. The introduction of mechanical science and military technology into China by way of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau had helped with the upsurge of modern industries and military establishments. With the growing influence of the West and the founding of modern educational institutions, a new intelligentsia in the Guangdong region came into being. They soon became the instrumental force behind political, economic, social and ideological reforms in China, the origins of which could be traced back to the maritime trade and the East-West exchange in Guangdong during the past 2,000 years.

The Hong Kong Museum of History is located at 100 Chatham Road South, Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon. It opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays and from 10am to 5pm on Christmas Eve and Lunar New Year Eve. It is closed on Tuesdays except public holidays and the first two days of Lunar New Year. Admission is $10 and a half-price concession is available to full-time students, senior citizens and people with disabilities. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

For details, please visit the Museum of History's website at http://hk.history.museum or call 2724 9042.

Latin Fiesta heats up Victoria Park this weekend
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Government Press Release

Free outdoor "Latin Fiesta" shows featuring exotic Latin America music and dance will be presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department this weekend (October 29 and 30) at the Central Lawn of Victoria Park at Causeway Bay. The shows will run from 2pm to 5pm.

The performances on Saturday will feature an exciting joint appearance by Mexico's Grupo Chuchumbe and Claudia Calderon's Piano Llanero Ensemble from Venezuela and Colombia. The two groups will provide an original introduction to Fandango traditions and bring refreshing Latin American music. Palo Santo, of Colombia, will present a variety of Latin American music whereas Puka Soncco, of Peru, will perform traditional Peruvian music. The Andes band will bring a fascinating glimpse of the rhythms, instruments and traditional costumes of Latin American.

On the dance front, people will be enchanted by the colours of Brazilian samba. Local group Tango Tang will showcase the world-famous Argentinean tango. Led by Joseph Ennin, Quick Step will perform energetic salsa performance.

Sunday's show will be equally attractive. Participants can dance non-stop to the music of the World's No.1 Salsa DJ Henry Knowles from New York and jam to the rhythm of the percussion ensemble of Aldo De Bongo, Gabbard, Victor Geronimo and De Kai.

Dancing duo John Narvaez and Liz Rojas from SalsaMania (San Francisco), the LA Salsa Kids (Los Angeles), Tamalyn Dallal (Miami) and the local salsaeros will perform hot and steamy Latin dances.

With guest appearances by the local multi-talented travelling-singer-songwriter Chet Lam and the world-famous Vocal Sampling from Cuba, the music will cross all boundaries and go beyond imagination. Grupo Chuchumbe and Claudia Calderon's Piano Llanero Ensemble, will also perform in the show.

A variety of interesting traditional Latin American games including the exciting pinata game, cute Mexican toys and creative drawing will also be featured in the both days.

For programme details, call 2591 1340.

Belgium brings its Best to Hong Kong
( 28/10/2005 )
Corporate Press Release

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The inaugural Best of Belgium Festival will uncover and display all things Belgian for an international Hong Kong audience

The first-ever Best of Belgium festival is set to cover Hong Kong with everything Belgian throughout the month of November.

"Belgians appreciate a good lifestyle as well as quality products, yet they are modest in character," said the Belgian Consul-General in Hong Kong, Mr Patrick Nijs. "With this festival, we wish to illustrate why Belgium is 'Europe's Best Kept Secret'".

An inaugural event organized by the Consulate of Belgium in Hong Kong, and the Belgium-Luxembourg Chamber of Commerce, there will be a variety of events, ranging from art and product exhibitions to musical shows and food fares.

Some of the exhibitions in store are Glass is Art highlighting the excellence of trendy Belgian designers such as Sem Schanzer and Diamond is Art put together by the International Gemological Institute (IGI) to highlight Belgian diamond polishers' unparalleled craftsmanship and artistic sense.

"Belgium is well-known as the international diamond trade centre of the world, and this exhibition is quite special, because we will be showcasing innovative signature cuts, including stones that are never shown to the public," said Marc Brauner, Belgian national and CEO of IGI in Hong Kong.

One of the other highlights of the Festival is the Comics Exhibition, which sets to show how Tintin and the Smurfs are not the only popular Belgian creations. For the delight of comics' fans, the exhibition will display 100 original drawings by more than 20 different Belgian artists. There will also be workshops for the general public, run jointly by Belgian and Hong Kong artists.

A Belgian Festival wouldn't be complete without a few pleasures for the senses, and Hong Kong people can look forward to wonderful Belgian delicacies such as grey shrimps, mussels, ham, beer, waffles, chocolates, and a lot more on special menus at various restaurants around town.

Continuing on the sensual theme will be a classical musical concert conducted by Belgian composer Dirk Brossé, together with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra, in celebration of the Kingdom's 175th Anniversary.

On a more intellectual note, will be a seminar on 'Local identities, European Integration and the Implications for East Asia', at the Hong Kong University, to explore Belgium's unique experience in constitutional drafting and implementation.

Other events include photo exhibitions entitled 'Parallelisms' by Belgian artist and Hong Kong resident, Christian Verhoeven, and another by Belgian photographer Kris Vervaeke, entitled 'It's in Hong Kong, it's Belgian, but did you know?' The latter aims to unveil the presence of Belgium through the inconspicuous blending of various Belgian products in Hong Kong's daily life.

Finally, to reinforce the reputation of Belgium's design capabilities, there will be a Belgian Design Contest Exhibition held in conjunction with the first-ever Innovation and Design Expo, catering to the international design community. Award-winning Belgian architects and designers are set to showcase their special works in Hong Kong for all to enjoy.

Links :
http://www.blcchk.org/bob/
http://www.innodesignexpo.com/index.htm

Corporate investing still a dream in a city bereft of arts patrons
5 November 2005
South China Morning Post

AFTER MORE THAN 15 years of precarious existence, San Francisco's earthquake-damaged MH de Young Memorial Museum was finally reborn last month as a US$200 million cross between a Mayan temple and an aircraft carrier beached in Golden Gate Park.

Designed by the world-renowned architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron (which also envisioned London's iconic Tate Modern), San Francisco's largest art museum at 27,220 square metres is another testament to the virility of private funding for the arts in the US.

Starting with her own US$10 million "seed money", museum board president and Dow Chemical heiress Diane Wilsey launched a decade-long fund-raising campaign in 1989 that brought in US$1,000 each from 7,000 donors and at least US$1 million a pop from San Francisco's foundations and corporations.

Even most of the museum's 19th-century American paintings were also donated - this time by another art-loving scion, John Rockefeller III. And, although it is officially owned by the city, the museum was actually established in 1985 with private money from San Francisco Chronicle co-founder Michael H. de Young.

In a way, the museum's genesis shows that magic formula behind the private-sector-led, free-market-driven flowering of the American arts scene.

As architect Jacques Herzog has told Bloomberg, most of the successful museums in the US are largely driven by free-enterprise hubris: "We have to understand the way collectors want to be visible and have their names on things."

Of course, it doesn't hurt that US cultural philanthropists get sizeable tax deductions for their contributions, a practice that has yet to find firm roots in Hong Kong.

"There is very little 'patron of the arts' mentality in Hong Kong when it comes to visual fine arts," says Katie de Tilly, owner and director of 10 Chancery Lane Gallery in Mid-Levels.

"Although the community is extremely generous with charitable donations, there's a lack of interest or importance to fund the arts and to nurture the youth towards the arts.

"There is very little interest in Hong Kong art by corporate or private or public collections compared with other international cities and I believe the whole society suffers from this trend. It is also nearly impossible to get private, corporate or public sponsorship for the arts in Hong Kong."

In the US, for instance, banker and philanthropist David Rockefeller founded the Business Committee for the Arts (BCA) in 1967 as a non-profit organisation that encourages firms to support artists and museums.

The practice has apparently caught on, as Bloomberg reported recently that corporate support for the arts now dwarfs that from the government. The main public body for cultural funding, the US National Endowment for the Arts, allotted US$102.9 million in grants in the year to September, from US$99.3 million in 2002.

In contrast, US businesses spent US$3.3 billion for the arts in 2003, from US$22 million in 1967, the BCA says.

"Hong Kong's tax laws do not encourage private funding to promote art and culture as practised in most European countries and in the US," affirms antiques expert Chiang Oi-ling, director of Gallery Oi Ling in Hollywood Road and Contes d'Orient in Lyndhurst Terrace.

"The incentive in Hong Kong is not the tax law but the actual object - buyers can get a good deal in Hong Kong." It is for this reason that Hong Kong - not China - is the trading centre for all important Chinese antiques, she adds.

"All important dealers in Chinese art come to Hong Kong to source," says Ms Chiang. "Chinese antique has always been under market value. But with the surge of wealth in China, most people see great potential in growth. We see more funds are being set up for the acquisition of Chinese art and antiques."

Ms Chiang has also noted a gradual shift in the way private and corporate antique collectors are increasingly relying on a new generation of local experts to source and buy items, instead of going to European dealers.

There has also been a noticeable increase in the number of Hong Kong collectors. Such a shift could further bolster Hong Kong's status as a centre for the Chinese arts and antiques markets. It also augurs well for the city's burgeoning arts community.

"There is an advantage to corporate investing in art," says Ms de Tilly. "I believe a collection's value can increase, but it is also a nice way of supporting a very important part of the society. I think that a corporate collection should not only be driven by investment purposes, but should also support the host community."

David Goode, chief executive of US railway Norfolk Southern that has been feted by the BCA for its contributions to the arts, puts it more succinctly. "[Art sponsorship] is not an advertisement for us," he told Bloomberg in a report. "As it enhances the quality of life in communities we serve, it makes them better places to do business."

For gallery owners such as Ms Chiang and Ms de Tilly, as well the growing ranks of Hong Kong's individual and corporate collectors of artworks and antiques, that mission continues - with or without tax incentives (although a small rebate will probably not hurt).

Hong Kong lags other cities in the world of arts; The industry has not taken off here, but wannabe art dealers can still make a decent living
5 November 2005
South China Morning Post

HONG KONG revels in its bustling economy and prowess in trade, but has yet to build a reputation in the arts.

Yet, Hong Kong cannot rely solely on its business acumen if it wants to establish itself as one of the great cities of the world.

Other major metropolises such as New York City have excelled in both economy and culture, boasting a vast array of art, world-class galleries and exhibitions. So why not Hong Kong?

Despite the government's wish for the city to become internationally known for its aesthetic identity, the arts have barely taken off.

Art dealers and industry experts differ in their opinions as to why the arts scene is not as successful as it should be. But most agree that a lack of contemporary art in Hong Kong hinders the progress and expansion of the sector.

"Hong Kong's art scene in comparison to other similar urban centres is actually very small and without much diversity," said John Batten of John Batten Gallery in Central.

He said it was difficult to run an art gallery that sold contemporary pieces rather than decorative or traditional art.

Dominique Perregaux of Art Statements Gallery said a faster way to advance the sector would be to present art in a more public friendly venue.

"Presenting art in a public forum such as a shopping mall will help the public 'escape' to the art, instead of dragging them to an exhibit," Mr Perregaux said.

Paolien Huang of 3boxes said: "In the 1960s people said that Hong Kong was a cultural desert. But this is no longer the case."

Ms Huang said recent developments among younger generations of artists were accelerating growth in the scene.

"As long as you are interested in art, you can find it every day," she added.

Originally from Taiwan, Ms Huang lived in New York before settling in Hong Kong. She opened 3boxes with business partner Wenren Yueyue with the encouragement and financial support of artist friends and art supporters in the community.

Ms Huang and Ms Wenren sell and exhibit art, but do not feel pressured to market what is commercially viable in the city.

"We are extremely lucky because we have the freedom [to display the art we want to] and the financial support to make it happen," Ms Huang said.

Other art dealers may find it difficult to get by financially.

Most galleries house themselves in the cosy, cultural niches found in the streets of SoHo and in Hollywood Road in Central.

Given the steep rents in the area, it is sometimes a matter of survival for galleries to offer the type of art that most people want to buy, rather than something more contemporary and adventurous.

Mr Batten said because art was in the eye of the beholder, it was more difficult to market and sell than most other products.

"Ideally, someone walks in, knows what they want and buys it," he said.

"But because art is so subjective, the atmosphere and the approach of the people are also important.

"Dealing in art is really a 'pseudo career', since you don't actually need specific qualifications {hellip} to become an art dealer," he said. However, Mr Batten said being a gallery owner or art dealer was just like any other vocation in that the money made selling art was as valid as the money made by a public servant shuffling papers.

According to Mr Batten, those who are interested in selling art should possess two qualities: sales skills and the knowledge to seek out a product that is fashionable.

Formerly a social worker with a degree in history from his studies in New Zealand, Mr Batten worked in different vocations before opening his own gallery.

"It is a career path that has given me a great deal of freedom and flexibility," he said. "But you also have to have a realistic attitude towards the financial aspects of selling art."

Mr Perregaux of Art Statements said a gallery was run like any other business. "In the first few years, gallery owners mostly make investments in their business. After that, it is usually a period of consolidation, branding [building the right credentials] and after that, reinvestment," he said.

"Art [dealing] is a lucrative business. The business may be personal, but ultimately, if [dealing in art] is something you want to do and want to survive in, you will definitely be able to achieve both."

Lack of curators hinders growth
5 November 2005
South China Morning Post

A SHORTAGE of art curators and other art professionals in the city is holding back the industry's expansion in Hong Kong, experts say.

"A curator is like an editor of a magazine. They find the best ways to bring out the issues of the theme [in art exhibitions] that you want to explore," said Christina Li, assistant curator of Para/Site Art Space in Sheung Wan.

"They represent the art space [and] make the decisions on exhibition pieces."

Before the arrival of art curator Tobias Berger, programmes at Para/Site were determined by the artists submitting their proposals. But now Mr Berger decides on the themes and generates the interaction between artists and ideas.

"They are essentially the [spokesmen] for the artists and space," Ms Li emphasised.

There are other types of jobs in the co-ordination and presentation of art. For example, Para/Site employs a project co-ordinator, a gallery manager, a curator and/or an executive director as well as an assistant curator.

In addition, with the development of the West Kowloon Cultural District Project, many new jobs will be created within the sector.

In a press release last year, the then chief secretary for administration Donald Tsang said "in the long run, this project will create for the local job market over 1,000 posts engaged in the operation and management of the arts and cultural facilities in the district".

So those looking to get into the art industry might be in luck over the next few years.

In terms of training, there is little available in Hong Kong for prospective candidates looking to become art curators. Courses in art history and fine arts are offered at most higher learning institutions, but official training for curators must be done overseas.

Mr Berger plans to train one curator for each of the three years he will be in Hong Kong.

"Right now the [art] scene is quite young," Ms Li said. "But hopefully the whole standard [of] the art scene will benefit, as the quality of Hong Kong art will improve by having new people [and] work and ideas brought in."

Crystal Tai

Free concert featuring Filipino music at Hong Kong Cultural Centre Piazza
Friday, November 11, 2005
Government Press Release

A free programme “Concert in the Park Goes to HKCC Piazza” paying tribute to Filipino musicians in Hong Kong will be held on November 20 (Sunday) from 1pm to 6pm at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Piazza.

The concert will feature the history of Filipino music in Hong Kong for the last 60 years. Apart from musical presentation, there will also be photo exhibition on the Filipino musicians in Hong Kong.

The Pinoy Music Provider will kick off the concert with popular tunes from the 1940s to the 1960s. Performing with the big band are famous jazz singer Lita Carrillo, pianist Bading Tuason and trumpet player Berry Yaneza.

The all-male Akostika Band will play songs from the 1970s while Alex Ahongon and his Miga International Band will also sing hit songs of the 70s and all original Pinoy music (OPM).

The father and son tandem of Filemon Corpus, violinist at the age of 82 and his son, Ernesto, a pianist; and the Absolute 5 Band and the Kabihog Band will play songs of the 1980s.

Bading Tuason and His Jazz Band will bring the audience back to the 90s while Alex Canda and the Websight Band will complete the concert with popular tunes from 1980 to 2000.

The popular DJs of Good Evening Kabayan: Stan Yumang, Mel Lirio, Jr., and EJ Emata, will be the program hosts.

Jointly presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) and the Philippine Consulate General, Concert in the Park serves as a cultural exchange between the Philippines community and local citizens.

For further details, please call 2591 1340 (LCSD) or 2823 8513 (Consulate General of the Philippines) during office hours.

Hong Kong Cultural Centre Open House on November 20
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Government Press Release

The Hong Kong Cultural Centre (HKCC) Open House will be held next Sunday (November 20), from 2pm to 6pm for people to enjoy free activities, including a pipe organ concert, dance and drama performances, magic shows, clowns and jugglers and a face-painting stall.

The pipe organ concert is the climax of training for a group of talented students from the Pipe Organ Education Series organised by the HKCC. They will join their instructor, Ms Gloria Wo, to show their glamour on stage through a series of exquisite repertoires.

The concert will be held at the Concert Hall and free tickets are available on a first-come-first-served basis at the HKCC Enquiries Counter. The limit is four tickets per person.

At the Foyer Stage, two groups of teenagers from the Dance Education Series and the Theatre Education Series will share their original creations with the public.

In addition, various artistic groups have been invited to perform Latin music, African drum, Eastern European folk dances, German folk music, Balinese music and dance at the Foyer Stage.

There will also be clowns and juggling, theatrical face-painting, Indonesian ethnic music demonstration and photo time with performers at the foyer area. No admission ticket is required for any of the foyer programmes.

For programme details, please call 2734 2009 or visit the HKCC homepage at www.hkculturalcentre.gov.hk

Sand sculptors show their creativity on the beach
Sunday, November 13, 2005
Government Press Release

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The Sai Kung District Sand Sculpture Competition cum Sand Sculpture Exchange Programme 2005, which is organised by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, staged at Clear Water Bay Second Beach today (November 13). Picture shows "Sandsfreaks" which won the overall championship with their work "Banyan".

http://gia.info.gov.hk/general/200511/13/P200511130139_photo_276069.JPG
Picture shows "Twin Dragon", the work of Kagoshima Hioki City Team of Japan. Their work was created based on a story in which two dragons met on beach in Hong Kong and they became friends.

More than 200 local sand sculptors showed their creativity in a competition at Clear Water Bay Second Beach, Sai Kung, today (November 13). A team of professional sand sculptors from Japan also demonstrated their skills.

The Sai Kung District Sand Sculpture Competition and Sand Sculpture Exchange Programme 2005 was organised by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department to create a showground for sand sculptors to utilise their skills and let beachgoers appreciate the creativity.

This year, 40 teams participated in the competition, including nine teams in the open division, 10 in the family division, 13 in the youth division and eight in the disabled division. The competition was a great opportunity for sand sculptors to share their experience, enhance teamwork spirit and foster close family ties.

The three themes suggested by the department were "The Rear Garden of HK – Sai Kung", "Olympic Equestrian Events in HK" and "HK's Collective Memory". Each participating team had to finish their works within one hour and 45 minutes in an area of about three metres by 4.5 metres.

When the competition was over, magnificent and eye-catching sand sculptures covered the beach. Spectators feasted their eyes on these artefacts which demonstrated sculptors' different creative ideas and fabulous craftsmanship.

Judging was based on skills, creativity, aesthetics and relevance to the themes.

Winners of today's competition were:

Open division: "Banyan" by "Sandsfreaks";

Family division: "Equestrian Fantasia" by "The Zoo";

Youth division: "Olympic Equestrian Events in HK" by "P.O.H. Chan Kwok Wai Primary School";

Disabled division: "Dream of Traveling in Space" by Richmond Fellowship of Hong Kong Team I.

The overall championship of the competition went to "Banyan" by "Sandsfreaks".

A sand sculpture team from Japan, Kagoshima Hioki City Team, was invited for a sand sculpture demonstration. Their work entitled "Twin Dragon" was based on a story in which two dragons met on a beach in Hong Kong and they became friends. The vivid and unique work was admired by spectators and set the tone for the competition.

Russian capella to perform in HK
Thursday, November 24, 2005
Government Press Release

The State Symphony Capella of Russia, which has won the hearts of audiences worldwide, will perform two concerts in Hong Kong next month (December) under the leadership of Veleri Polyansky.

To match the festive season, the programme includes Christmas carols like "Let It Snow", "Jingle Bells", "O Holy Night" and "The First Noel". There will also be Russian folk songs and classical selections from Bortniansky, Tchaikovsky, Mozart, Verdi, etc. Programmes are different for the two performances.

The State Symphony Capella of Russia was founded in 1991 by merging the USSR State Chamber Choir under Valeri Polyansky and the State Symphony Orchestra of the USSR Minstry of Culture headed by Gennady Rozhdestvensky. The Capella is renowned for its flexibility in phrasing, rich and warm tone, nobility of expression and skilfully balanced sounding sections.

Apart from performing in Russia, the Capella has toured in Spain, Hungary, France, Holland, Germany, Sweden, Canada, England, Italy, and other European countries. Over the years, the Capella has received critical acclaim for its flawless technique, beautiful tone, clear and precise intonation and unfailing attention to the poetic word.

Concerts will be staged at 8pm on Friday, December 23, at the Concert Hall, Hong Kong City Hall and 3pm on Saturday, December 24, at the Auditorium, Sha Tin Town Hall. Tickets priced from $80 to $200 are now available at all URBTIX outlets. Half-price tickets are available for senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients (limited CSSA tickets on a first-come, first-served basis). Please check out programme leaflets for group booking discount scheme.

For programme enquiries call 2268 7323 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp. Ticketing enquiries and reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Tickets can also be booked through www.urbtix.hk.

This is a "Cheers!" series programme presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. Other attractions of the series include "The Curious Incident of a Narrator" by Jumbo Kids Theatre, "Peter Pan and Wendy" by Shu Ning Presentation Unit, "Journey into the World of Hans Christian Andersen" by Ming Ri Institute for Arts Education, "Festive Revelries" by the Hong Kong YWCA Chinese Orchestra, "Li Ning - The Legend of Magic with China Acrobatic Circus", "The Nutcracker" by Hong Kong Ballet, "Golden Jubilee Christmas Concert" by Hong Kong Oratorio Society, New Year Concert by the Vienna Johann Strauss Capelle, "Diafan" by Pep Bou (Spain) and "Whimsical Puppets" by Sichuan Huge Puppet Troupe of China.

Viennese music and dance to delight HK audiences
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
Government Press Release

Viennese dances, and particularly the dance music written by the prolific Strauss dynasty of composers has long delighted audiences. The Johann Strauss Capelle from Vienna will bring this Viennese tradition of music and dance to Hong Kong.

Under the leadership of conductor Michael Tomaschek, the troupe will perform some of the world’s favourite dance music, with the soprano Marcela Cerna of the Vienna Volksoper and ballet dancers. The programme includes “Tritsch-Tratsch Polka”, “Emperor Waltz”, “Gold and Silver Waltz”, “Csardas (from Die Fledermaus)”, “Champagn Polka”, “Radetzkymarsch”, and many more...

Concerts will be staged at 8pm on January 2 and 3, 2006 (Monday and Tuesday) at the Auditoriums of Yuen Long Theatre and Sha Tin Town Hall. Tickets priced from $100 to $280 are now available at all URBTIX outlets. Half-price tickets are available for senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients (limited CSSA tickets on a first-come, first-served basis). Please check out programme leaflets for the group booking discount scheme.

For programme enquiries call 2268 7323 or visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp. Ticketing enquiries and reservations can be made on 2734 9009 and credit card telephone bookings on 2111 5999. Tickets can also be booked through www.urbtix.hk.

This is a “Cheers!” series programme presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. Other attractions of the series include “The Curious Incident of a Narrator” by Jumbo Kids Theatre, Peter Pan and Wendy by Shu Ning Presentation Unit, “Journey into the World of Hans Christian Andersen” by Ming Ri Institute for Arts Education , “Festive Revelries” by the Hong Kong YWCA Chinese Orchestra, “Li Ning - The Legend of Magic with China Acrobatic Circus”, “The Nutcracker” by Hong Kong Ballet, “Golden Jubilee Christmas Concert” by Hong Kong Oratorio Society, concert by the State Symphony of Capella of Russia, “Diafan” by Pep Bou (Spain) and “Whimsical Puppets” by Sichuan Huge Puppet Troupe of China.

文物中心耗千萬元興建
12/12/2005

【本報訊】耗資一千萬元興建的文物中心樓面總面積約八百二十平方米，由兩幢樓高兩層的主樓和一幢單層附屬建築物組成，設施包括展覽館、活動室、考古工作室和戶外休憩室，而附屬建築物會改建為考古文物倉庫。

文物中心主樓設有佔地一百零五平方米的鄧族文物展廳，介紹新界和屏山鄧族自宋朝移居香港以來的歷史、傳統和儀式，同時亦有介紹屏山文物徑的歷史建築物，以及新界各警署歷史等。

而鄧聖時擁有的祖屋「秀才故居」，是清朝道光年間，屏山鄧族兩位秀才——文林郎（文秀才）鄧述卿及武庠生（武秀才）鄧大成的故居，坐落於屏山坑尾村，佔地約一百四十平方米，至今已有一百六十多年歷史。屋內一桌一椅均與當年無異，是全港保存圍村歷史文物最豐富完好的私人居所，多年來也有政府機構、學校和團體前來參觀。 http://the-sun.orisun.com/channels/img/endmarker.gif

Hong Kong shows up the ante on Asia's burgeoning art market

HONG KONG, April 7, 2006 (AFP) - In one gallery hangs a Picasso portrait of Dora Maar, a bold primary-colour work of abstract genius. In the next, delicate inks by Chinese traditionalist Qi Baishi speak of tranquil landscapes.

As a collection of work, they couldn't be more different but both -- along with dozens more pieces from China and Europe -- have been brought together in a series of Hong Kong art exhibitions and auctions expected to cement Asia's place in the top flight of the art-buying world.

Not only are the region's art buyers now ranked among the most important in the world, its artists are also beginning to acquire a reputation that is driving worldwide demand for their work.

"The Asian market is maturing incredibly quickly," says David Norman, head of impressionists at global auction giant Sotheby's.

"And this doesn't look like it will be a bubble -- Asians are buying not just as financial investments, they are buying because they appreciate the art," Norman adds. "That's the best sort of buyer."

Both Sotheby's and rival Christie's have made permanent homes in Hong Kong, which has become the focus of the region's burgeoning art market.

Buyers from around Asia, although mostly from China, Taiwan and Japan, gather for the two houses' biannual auctions here, which over the past couple of years have concentrated on Asian -- especially Chinese -- items.

"Hong Kong is a magnet for the Asian art world," says Guy Bennett, senior vice-president and head of evening sales for Christie's. "We used to concentrate on Tokyo, but the focus has moved to Hong Kong."

Sotheby's Hong Kong spring sale, which kicked off Friday, illustrates the wealth of supply in the region.

A group of 58 modern Chinese pieces from the collection of famed Chinese art dealer Robert Chang makes up the core of an estimated 1.7 billion Hong Kong dollars (217 million US dollars) worth of lots about to go under the hammer.

The four-day sale is so big it has had to be housed for the first time in the cavernous Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

As well as the Chang collection there are pieces by lesser-known artists such as Zhang Daqian and Li Keran as well as a selection of Chinese jewellery and watches.

All items have price tags of 100,000 US dollars and up.

"Hong Kong is the new third leg in the world art market -- after New York and London," says Henry Howard-Sneyd, Sotheby's director for China and Southeast Asia.

Demand for Chinese art has exploded in recent years.

Sotheby's first ever auction of contemporary Chinese art at its New York rooms earlier this month fetched almost 13 million dollars, including 979,200 dollars paid by an anonymous bidder for "Bloodline Series: Comrade No. 120" (1998), a portrait by Zhang Xiaogang.

And last summer, a sale of Chinese ceramics and paintings in Hong Kong fetched a record 81 million dollars for the venerable house.

Prices for Asian art are well short of the dizzy heights asked for top European works -- Picasso's "Boy With a Pipe" holds the record for art bought at auction at 104 million dollars.

But growing global interest is pushing their value steadily higher.

"The market is a nascent one but prices have appreciated in a very short space of time," says Howard-Sneyd.

Running concurrently with the Chinese art sale are exhibitions at both houses' Hong Kong rooms that preview their upcoming New York auctions of impressionist and modernist art.

As well as the Picasso at Sotheby's, two pieces by the Spanish master are on offer at rival Christie's along with a magnificent Van Gogh, "L'Arlesienne, Madame Ginoux". Each piece is expected to fetch in the region of 50 million dollars.

Christie's Bennett says that while Asia hasn't the huge number of big buyers like the US or Russia -- the biggest art collectors -- it does have a growing number of educated investors.

Neither auction house offers data on the size of the Asian market and both keep their buyers' identities confidential, but most Asian buyers are believed to be industrialists and tycoons.

Very few are art investors and so far art-buying investment funds have yet to make their presence felt in the region, says Howard-Sneyd.

Exhibitions like those currently being held in the city are hoped to foster greater interest among them.

"Asian buyers are relatively new to the market and new entrants usually bid for items that are contemporary and from their own region," says Bennett.

"But we have found already that Asians are migrating into the traditional art markets and buying European works.

"An element of it is investment driven but our research has found that most of it is from incredibly wealthy people who have done their homework and have become incredibly sophisticated buyers in a short space of time," Bennett says. mmc/nw

Record Hong Kong auctions hailed a "new era" for Chinese art

HONG KONG, April 10, 2006 (AFP) - An 18th century antique sword fetched a record 5.93 million dollars at auction in Hong Kong Monday, ushering what experts hailed as a new era in the market for Chinese antiquities.

The Baoteng Sabre, one of a set of 90 ceremonial swords struck by the smithy of Emperor Qianlong during his 1736-95 reign, was snapped up by an anonymous mainland Chinese bidder, setting a new record at auction for an imperial work of art and for a Chinese sword.

The jade-hilted steel-bladed weapon, which had a reserve price of 1.04 million dollars, was the first of the 90 to find its way onto the open market, auctioneers Sotheby's said.

"This heralds a new era in the Chinese art and antiquities market," said Nicholas Chow, Sotheby's specialist in charge of imperial art.

Chow said he expected the record bid to radically alter buying tastes in Chinese art, which had so far been dominated by so-called "blue-and-white" dynastic porcelain.

"The price it fetched was way above our expectations," he said. "This is likely to spark interest in imperial Chinese art away from ceramics."

The same buyer snapped up a rare metal-plated satin suit of parade armour also owned by Emperor Qianlong for 1.89 million dollars, setting a record for Chinese textiles.

The sword and armour were part of a four-day sale of Chinese art, jewellery and porcelain that had a total reserve value of 217 million dollars, the most valuable sale of Asian art ever held.

Sotheby's has yet to calculate the total take for the four days of auctions.

Earlier, "Pink Lotus", a simple almost child-like rendering of a bowl of flowers by contemporary artist San Yu, went for 3.6 million dollars, setting a record for a modern Chinese painting sold at auction.

In just a few years, Hong Kong has overtaken Tokyo as the Asian focus of the world art market, driven mostly by the emergence of wealthy Chinese in the art-buying super league.

Shakespeare First Folio on show in Hong Kong

HONG KONG, May 25, 2006 (AFP) - A copy of a 383-year-old collection of Shakespeare's plays that has been hailed the "most important book in English literature" was unveiled in Hong Kong Thursday ahead of its sale in London.

"Mr William Shakespeare's Comedies, Histories and Tragedies" -- famously known as the First Folio -- is one of just 250 surviving copies of the collection.

Printed seven years after his death by his friends John Heminge and Henry Condell, the copy is thought to be the best preserved of the 19 that have ever been put up for sale, said Peter Selley of auction house Sotheby's.

"Along with the English Bible, which was first printed a year earlier, this is one of the most important books in the English language -- it's the most important in English literature," Selley said.

Sotheby's expects the leather-bound volume of 18 plays, including "Hamlet" and "Twelfth Night", to fetch at least 2.5 million pounds (4.67 million dollars) at auction on July 13.

"A copy that was not in as good condition as this sold for five million dollars at auction so we think this will do very well," Selley added.

The book is the property of the little-known Dr William's Library in London and is believed to have had only two owners since it was printed.

Unusually, it is still bound in its original cover and unlike other surviving copies contains almost all its original pages.

The only facsimile page is that which contains Ben Johnson's famous poem introduction.

"Over the years, pages have been taken from copies of the First Folio to replace lost pages in other copies," said Selley. "This is unique in that it has all but one of its original pages."

Few if any of Shakespeare's plays were printed in his lifetime and just two pages of manuscript are all that remain of his own written works.

"If it wasn't for this book, these plays and a huge and vital part of our culture would have been lost," said Selley.

Posted: 27 June 2006 1850 hrs
Global auction houses rush to tap fast growing art market in Hong Kong
By Channel NewsAsia's Hong Kong Correspondent Steven Jiang

HONG KONG: With more Asian art collectors on a shopping spree, global auction houses are rushing into Hong Kong.

Art - both modern and traditional - is certainly taking centre stage in mainland China and Hong Kong.

An emerging group of Asian buyers has been sweeping the market in recent years, much to the delight of industry leaders.

"We've witnessed a big price hike in modern Chinese ink paintings and Chinese ceramics. One of the biggest factors has been the entry of mainland Chinese collectors into this market," said Ken Yeh, Deputy Chairman for Asia, Christie's.

The auction houses are wasting no time zooming in to their new best customers.

Even Christie's arch-rival shares its bullish view on Hong Kong.

"You are geographically very well placed, with great communications. The rule of law and the sort of the proven security of selling and buying art at auction here in Hong Kong really makes it an ideal auction centre," said Henry Howard-Sneyd, Deputy Chairman for Europe and Asia, Sotheby's.

Art patrons from mainland China have been flocking to auctions here, and experts say these Chinese buyers are quick learners and sensible bidders.

"They won't pay stupid prices for things. If they're pushing up prices much higher than before, it's because they have a different series of values. They simply think the prices are too cheap up until now," said Mr Howard-Sneyd.

While most Asian collectors still prefer Asian art works, auctioneers are also bringing Western masterpieces to Asia.

"Part of the mission we have here is to introduce people to things they have never seen before, and we don't bring second- or third-rate quality pieces, we bring the very best," said Mr Howard-Sneyd.

As the number of newly rich in Asia grows, collectors in the region are clearly starting to re-paint the global art market with strokes as bold as Picasso's.

Check out this Street Art Exhibition happening this Friday

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July 1 - 30 at IdN Gallery, 5-9 Gresson St, Wanchai, HK
Mon Fri 12-8pm Sat Sun 12-6pm

Hong Kong Museum of Art to extend opening hours
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Government Press Release

The opening hours of the Hong Kong Museum of Art will be extended to 8pm on Saturdays, a spokesman for the Leisure and Cultural Services Department said today (July 12).

Starting next month, the museum will open from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Wednesday and on Fridays, Sundays and public holidays; and from 10am to 8pm on Saturdays. It will be closed on Thursdays except those that fall on public holidays.

The mission of the Museum of Art is to preserve the cultural heritage of China and promote art with a local focus. Its collections now number in excess of 14,000 items, including Chinese paintings and calligraphy works, antique Chinese treasures, paintings of historical significance and creations by local artists.

Highlights of the museum's collections are on display in the exhibition galleries. To maintain an international character, the museum also presents a variety of exhibitions drawn from local and overseas sources. Currently on is "The World of Etruscans" which runs until September 10.

A wide range of educational programmes are also organised in support of the exhibitions to enhance participants' knowledge of and interest in artistic creation.

The Museum of Art is located at 10 Salisbury Road, Tsim Sha Tsui. For enquiries, call 2721 0116.

Martha Argerich is coming to perform on 27th July.

Time to refine the business of culture
9 September 2006
South China Morning Post

The exhibition of works from the Centre Pompidou in Paris, beginning later this month, will mark the second year running that the Hong Kong Museum of Art has splashed out on a display of French collections. Happily for art lovers, this means more is likely to be spent on delivering artworks to the public than on overheads such as electricity, cleaning and security, not to mention salaries - which is the usual case in our government-run museums.

Last year's Impressionism exhibition from the National Collection of Treasures of France cost more than HK$10 million to stage. The Pompidou paintings, sculptures and installations will cost no less. This is a significant investment in a vision of a cultural life fitting for an international business centre. The sad likelihood, however, is that many will see it as dubious and elitist. The Impressionism exhibition drew 95,000 visitors in two months. That falls well short of crowds at the science and space museums.

The government is to be commended for such high-profile support for the arts, but it is not an investment that will pay off without fundamental reform of the culture of government-run museums. Generally speaking they do not give the highest priority to acquisitions and displays that will attract crowds. Not surprisingly, they lose money.

The West Kowloon cultural hub project has focused attention on the arts sector and the way museums are funded and run. Wherever they thrive elsewhere, private or corporate philanthropy plays a significant role. Hong Kong's super rich have a tradition of giving to the needy or the worthy - such as medical research - but giving to the arts generally is in its infancy. A recent HK$36 million donation by Swire Pacific to the Hong Kong Philharmonic is an exceptional corporate gift rather than the rule. One aim of the government's original plan for the West Kowloon cultural complex was to encourage business investment in the arts. The plan has gone back to the drawing board, but a new model should include features to promote business sponsorship, such as matching grants and tax breaks.

More funding is no guarantee that exhibitions will succeed financially. But it should lead to planning and promotion of exhibitions that attract fee-paying crowds. Printed programmes and merchandise based on exhibitions or collections could be other sources of revenue.

The West Kowloon project still offers a commercially successful city the opportunity to show it can manage its own cultural venues without depending on a drip feed of public money or management by overseas institutions, and to showcase the cultural achievements of our own and the wider Chinese society.

A mix of private, corporate and public support could eventually liberate our cultural organisations, subject to scrutiny by official audit and through annual reporting to the Legislative Council.

I absolutely love last year's French Impressionism exhibition which paintings were on loan from Musee d'Orsay.

It is great news that Pompidou agreed to lend us some stuff for exhibition, and there's Picasso!

Vienna Philharmonic performing in Hong Kong
Government Press Release
Sunday, September 24, 2006

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Music lovers who could not get tickets to see the world renowned Vienna Philharmonic will get another chance tomorrow (September 25) to watch the performance.

Tonight's (September 24) sell-out concert at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall was telecast live on screens set up at Hong Kong Cultural Centre Piazzas for a few thousand people.

The orchestra will perform at 8pm tomorrow at the same venue and the concert will again be telecast.

Renowned Russian Valery Gergiev will conduct the orchestra to play Mozart's "Symphony No. 36 in C, 'Linz'" and Tchaikovsky's "Symphony No.5 in E Minor" tomorrow.

Considered one of the finest orchestras in the world, the Vienna Philharmonic was founded in 1842. In its more than 160-year history, the orchestra has been associated with many gifted composers, conductors and musicians and won their highest commendations.

The orchestra's list of conductors also included many prominent names such as Gustav Mahler, Richard Strauss, Herbert von Karajan, Leonard Bernstein, Claudio Abbado.

Admission to the Cultural Centre Piazza is free on a first-come, first-served basis. People will be admitted to the piazza from 7pm. A 45-minute pre-concert documentary (in Cantonese), showing the splendid history of the orchestra and excerpts of their past performances, will be screened before the telecast.

Concert by Vienna Philharmonic is presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. Tonight's show was sponsored by Outblaze; Typhoon Games; Mr & Mrs Yat Siu; Mr & Mrs Maximilian YK Ma and Computime, while tomorrow's concert is sponsored by Mr Albert Hung, JP and Mr Wilfred Ng, MH; piazza live relay is sponsored by Henderson Land Group.

Problem is that tickets were far too expensive and the acoustics of our cultural centre sucks like mad...

$460m Picasso to draw the crowds
Caroline Kim
Hong Kong Standard
Thursday, October 05, 2006

One of Pablo Picasso's most prominent paintings, Angel Fernandez de Soto, worth an estimated HK$460 million, made a rare appearance Wednesday at a Hong Kong preview of his masterpieces to be auctioned at Christie's in New York next month.

The piece on Angel de Soto - a close friend of the Spanish painter - has been referred to as one of the most important paintings during Picasso's Blue Period which lasted from 1901 to 1904.

Ken Yeh Cheng-yuan, deputy chairman of Christie's Asia branch, said that although Picasso had painted his comrade on other occasions before 1903, the painting exhibited more of the artist's character and his work.

"Paintings like Angel Fernandez de Soto are the most sought after by Picasso's collectors," said Yeh, who added that previous pieces had been sold for between HK$145 million and HK$430 million each.

Yeh, who expects higher bids for Angel Fernandez de Soto than previous pieces, claims that since the auctioning of Picasso's other Blue Period piece, Femme aux bras croises in 2000, for US$55 million (HK$429 million), similar pieces are in big demand.

Following the tragic suicide of his best friend and a series of financial struggles, Picasso went through a stage of depression, isolation and loneliness, serving as an inspiration for the Blue Period. "Exaggeration of the subject's features, including his crooked nose and jaw, twisted lips and bony fingers exert an unpleasant image," Yeh said.

Guy Bennett, senior vice president and head of Christie's Impressionist and Modern Art department in New York, said: "We're thrilled to offer a work of such stature by Picasso in our evening sale this November."

Bennett said previous successful auctions have made "[Christie's] the natural choice to handle the sale."

Heavily secured with 24-hour surveillance, Angel Fernandez de Soto has drawn an estimated insurance cost of US$50 million.

Donated by Andrew Lloyd Webber - one of Britain's most famous musicals composers - all the proceeds from the sale of the painting, which was originally bought for US$19 million, will go to various charities under the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation. The painting is one of 28 pieces of art scheduled to be auctioned after a preview tour across Europe and Asia.

Other prominent pieces include Paul Gauguin's L'homme a la hache worth up to US$45 million and Andy Warhol's Mao, worth US$12 million.

The paintings can be viewed by the public at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Wan Chai today and tomorrow.

First Hong Kong concert for Macao Orchestra
Friday, October 6, 2006
Government Press Release

The Macao Orchestra will next month add an important entry to its impressive resume - its first concert in Hong Kong.

Father ureo de Castro founded the Macao Chamber Orchestra in 1983 and in 2001, the Cultural Affairs Bureau of the Macao Special Administrative Region Government expanded the chamber orchestra into a medium-sized orchestra with double winds. In 2002 it was renamed the Macao Orchestra. En Shao, who has conducted the London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, Hall, Bournemouth, the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestras and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, became its first Music Director and Principal Conductor.

The orchestra has worked with internationally renowned musicians and conductors including John Lill, Wang Jian, Li Chuanyun, Xue Wei, Boris Berezovsky, Nikolai Demidenko, Kun Woo Paik, Joshua Bell, Antje Weithaas, Michel Dalberto, Tams Vsry, Tomas Netopil, Liao Changyong, Li-Wei, Lam Bun Ching, Yip Wing Sie, Chen Xieyang, L Shao Chia, L Jia, Hu Yongyan, Zhang Guoyong, Yu Feng and Huang Anlun.

In next month's concert, under the leadership of En Shao, the orchestra will perform with pianist Chen Hung-kuan and violist Henning Kraggerud. The delightful all-Beethoven programme includes "Overture to Egmont, Op. 84", "Piano Concerto No.4 in G, Op. 58" and "Violin Concerto in D, Op. 61".

Chen was born in Taiwan in 1958 and raised in Germany. He is probably the most decorated pianist in Boston, winning prizes and awards in the Chopin, Geza Anda the Montreal and the Queen Elisabeth competitions. He won the Gold Medal in the Arthur Rubinstein and the Busoni Competitions, as well as receiving the award of an Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1991. He has performed with the Houston Baltimore,Israel, the Tonhalle, Montreal,Pittsburgh symphonies, the Royal Orchestra of Belgium, the Mozart Festival Orchestra of San Francisco and many others. He worked with conductors such as Hnas Graf, Christoph Eschenbach, George Cleve Josef Silverstein and Sui Lan and artists as Laurence Lesser, Yo-Yo Ma, Roman Totenberg Zsigmondy, Leslie Parnas, Bion Tsang, Anthony Gigliotti and Tema Blackstone in concert.

Henning Kraggerud, the young Norwegian violist, is one of Scandinavia's most important artists. He has performed with the Oslo Philharmonic, the Budapest Festival Orchestra, the St Petersburg Philharmonic, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and more. Kraggerud enjoys a close relationship with many of the major Scandinavian orchestras and has worked with conductors such as Marek Janowski, Ivan Fischer, Paavo Berglund, Kirill Petrenko, Yakov Kreizberg, Mariss Jansons and Kurt Sanderling. Highlights of the last few seasons have included two visits to the Komische Oper Orchestra in Berlin performing Tchaikovsky under Kreizberg and Mendelssohn under Petrenko, performances of the Sibelius concerto with the Bergen Philharmonic to open their season, his highly successful debut at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw performing Mendelssohn with the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra.

This is a programme of "A Greater Pearl River Delta Cultural Cooperation Project" presented by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, the concert by the Macao Orchestra will be staged at 8pm, November 17 (Friday) at the Auditorium, Sha Tin Town Hall. Tickets priced at $150, $120 and $100 are now available at all URBTIX outlets. Half-price concessions will be granted to senior citizens, people with disabilities, full-time students and Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients. (Limited tickets for Comprehensive Social Security Assistance recipients are available on a first-come, first-served basis.)

For programme enquiries, call 2268 7321; for ticketing enquiries and reservations call 2734 9009. Internet bookings are available at www.urbtix.hk. For credit card telephone bookings, call 2111 5999. Visit www.lcsd.gov.hk/cp for more information on the programme.

Hong Kong conductor lashes out over arts funding

HONG KONG, Oct 30, 2006 (AFP) - World-renowned conductor Edo de Waart has hit out at the government and businesses in Hong Kong for neglecting the city's tepid arts scene, a media report said Monday.

Dutch-born de Waart, who has headed the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra since 2003, urged a "culture change" in the wealthy southern Chinese territory to place it on the international arts map.

"There needs to be a culture change, where the government says we want first-rate art that is ours," he told the Hong Kong-published Wall Street Journal Asia.

"It galls me that the government pays to bring in an orchestra from Germany for two nights. One would think you would bundle all your resources, pick out five or seven cultural institutions and try to use them to pull the rest forward. That is not the case."

De Waart has made no secret of his irritation at the lack of a domestic arts network in Hong Kong.

Government funding of arts projects is minimal and a lack of venues makes it difficult to host touring exhibitions or concerts.

Under de Waart the HKPO has emerged as one of the leading orchestras in the world. But still it often plays to half-empty houses.

The maestro complained that Hong Kong's wealthy have shown little interest in stepping in where government has failed.

"Apart from a few corporations, business isn't doing anything in Hong Kong," he told the Journal.

"And it would be nice if some of the unbelievably rich people that Hong Kong has would say they are going to do something for Hong Kong in the arts."

By DA32EM4321 from a Hong Kong transport forum :

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g65/dennisme30/IMG_1024.jpg

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g65/dennisme30/IMG_1057.jpg

Pretty cool

So this guy prefered painting Kowloon's skyline than the traditional skyscrapers of HK Island.

Not everyone is just interested in the postcard vantage points. Hong Kong has a lot more to offer than that.

Not everyone is just interested in the postcard vantage points. Hong Kong has a lot more to offer than that.

true though most buyers would prefer paintings with the hk skyline.

Anyway, most artist create scenes that suits their interests and they paint what they want. Not those that people want.

true though most buyers would prefer paintings with the hk skyline.

Anyway, most artist create scenes that suits their interests and they paint what they want. Not those that people want.
I doubt the painter in the post was coming up with works for sale. It looks more for personal interest.

From the looks of it, he's using watercolours as a medium.

It's quite obvious from the canvas. I doubt anyone will try to do an oil-based on that board.

Heritage Museum to showcase Chinese paintings by Henry Wo Yue-kee
Government Press Release
Saturday, March 31, 2007

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More than 40 Chinese paintings by renowned painter Henry Wo Yue-kee over the past five decades and covering subjects of flowers and plants, birds, animals, as well as landscapes, will go on display tomorrow (April 1).

The exhibition, "The Poetic Spirit – The Art of Henry Wo Yue-kee", will run at the Hong Kong Heritage Museum until September 24.

It is the prelude to the "Chao Shao-an Student Exhibition Series" newly launched by the Hong Kong Heritage Museum which aims to introduce the ways in which features of the Lingnan School - of which Wo was a member - are carried on in the works of students of Chao Shao-an, a great master in Chinese painting, and how innovations are made by individual artists.

The exhibition was opened today (March 31) by the Assistant Director (Heritage and Museums) of Leisure and Cultural Services (LCSD), Dr Louis Ng Chi-wah, Mr Henry Wo, LCSD Museum Advisers, Professor Kao Mayching and Dr Leo KK Wong, and the Chief Curator of the Heritage Museum, Ms Belinda Wong Sau-lan.

Henry Wo, born in 1927, is a native of Dongguan, Guangdong province. In 1947, he studied painting in the International Art School in Hong Kong in both Western and Chinese style. Then he studied with Chao Shao-an from 1949. He started his teaching career in 1955 and held his first solo exhibition in Hong Kong. Ever since, he had held many exhibitions of his works in Hong Kong and overseas. In 1975, he emigrated to the United States, where he focused on painting and teaching. Working in a studio at the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Washington DC, he painted and made exchanges with other artists and visitors, thus carrying out the aims of his teacher and of the Today's Art Association in the promotion of ink painting overseas.

Wo studied with Chao for more than 10 years. Chao taught his students comprehensively by first introducing the basic approach: studying the works of the teacher and painting in that style - beginning with the album leaves, then the horizontal, and later the vertical format. In terms of subject, they learned to paint from simple ones to the complicated ones, the last being tiger and the peacock. During lessons, Chao often painted from life, or chose scenes from pictures and reworked the important parts. He encouraged students to paint together, where he gave guidance on the side, added the final finishes and assessed students' works.

Chao was very friendly with artists, and extended his helpfulness to them in many ways. He cared for his students, and often helped them by waiving the tuition fee. When students held their own exhibition, Chao would give detailed guidance. When Wo had his first solo exhibition, a famous artist was also trying to secure the same venue for an exhibition. Chao helped Wo secure the venue.

Wo thought that Chao's art was expressed in quick brushstrokes and brief compositions. It looked simple and easy to learn, but it was very difficult to reach excellence. Students could imitate the compositions, but elements like brushstrokes, composition and use of colour required much practice. Chao requested his students to sketch from nature and from life in order to establish their own style. Chao devoted his life to teaching and promoting his art. As a result, there are many students spreading the style around the world.

In the spirit of Chao, Wo closely observed nature and sketched wherever he went. He loves nature, and considers his art a praise or salute to his environment. His sketches and paintings recorded scenes from Hong Kong, his native town Dongguan, picturesque settings of towns along the canals of Eastern China, and forests and coastlines of the United States. He extends his careful and loving observation to flowers, plants, birds and animals which are represented in his works.

Wo's favourite subject is the lotus and he made every effort to study them. While living in the States, he visited the botanical gardens every year to sketch and paint them on-site. Wo excels in depicting the lotus in different weather and seasons with a highly poetic mood. He paints the young buds in early summer, blossoms withstanding the rain and wind, and the lotus withering in the frost. He frequently sets his works under the moon, with a sense of serene and gentle atmosphere. Other scenes are set in morning mist, in the sunset or in different seasons. This sense of poetry is created by the use of colour, light and ink washes.

Wo develops his own technique of overlaying washes on fibrous paper, for the effects of dampness and softness. To the Western eye, this echoes with certain techniques of watercolour, and no doubt serves as a bridge for the East and West in artistic creation and appreciation.

Located at 1 Man Lam Road, Sha Tin, the Heritage Museum opens from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Saturday, and from 10am to 7pm on Sundays and public holidays. It is closed on Tuesdays (except public holidays). Admission is $10, with a half-price concession for senior citizens aged 60 or above, people with disabilities and full-time students. Admission is free on Wednesdays.

Car parking is available at the Heritage Museum. Those who prefer to use public transport may take the KCR Ma On Shan line to the Che Kung Temple station, which is within five minutes' walk of the museum.

For enquiries, call 2180 8188. For details of the exhibition, visit the Heritage Museum's website at http://hk.heritage.museum/.

Let's make the most of joining the cultural elite
11 December 2007
South China Morning Post

Hong Kong's inclusion among the arts and museum world elite in a project to create a global cultural hub is an accolade worth savouring. Not only does this lay to rest any contention that our city is a cultural desert, but it also goes a step further in telling all that we have artistic skills and talent that are sought and worth sharing.

Those immersed in the local arts community do not find our involvement in such a scheme surprising; they have long known the depth and breadth of Hong Kong's artistic talents. But for the majority of us not in the know, finding that the Hong Kong Cultural Centre's administrators, the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, will meet in Spain next week with counterparts from prestigious organisations like Paris' Pompidou Centre, the Sydney Opera House and the Lincoln Centre in New York is eye-opening.

Billed by the organisers of the forum as a "cultural G8", they will discuss global challenges and international collaboration in the arts. There is a more focused agenda for bringing the sides together, though: an arts complex to be built in the Spanish port of Aviles.

Just what the extent of the Hong Kong contribution to the project will be has to be spelled out. Nonetheless, that government officials who are central to the arts will be meeting with some of the leading lights in the field says much about how far Hong Kong has come.

A decade ago, tall buildings, business and commerce came to mind before arts and culture when thinking of Hong Kong. That is shifting with the emergence of an increasingly vibrant arts scene and government moves for the long-sought West Kowloon cultural district heading in the right direction after several false starts.

This is not to say that there is no room for improvement. Some in the arts community contend, for example, that the government's grip on venues is too tight and that by giving greater autonomy in their operation to professionals, there could be an even more flourishing arts and culture environment. In such circumstances, the meeting in Spain will have dual benefits: to showcase the dynamism of our arts and culture scene, while giving officials the chance to glean new ideas from their counterparts.

im speechless!!!
http://asianfriends.4.forumer.com/

Asia joins art fair boom with Tokyo, Hong Kong debut

TOKYO/HONG KONG, March 3 (Reuters) - Outrageous parties, rich collectors, flamboyant art dealers and even the odd artist: contemporary art fairs are booming, thanks to a thriving art market and an international crowd of new rich socialites.

Asia has been striving to latch on to the global art fair trend, led by events such as ShContemporary's acclaimed debut in Shanghai last year. This year, both Tokyo and Hong Kong will launch new events modelled along hip fairs such as Art Basel and London's Frieze.

A satellite fair to the larger and more mixed Art Fair Tokyo in April, 101TOKYO bills itself as "the city's first truly international contemporary art fair".

In May, Hong Kong will host ART HK 08, featuring a stable of 100 galleries including New York's Max Lang and London's Albion Gallery, to showcase mostly Asian, but also top-tier Western art.

"I think there is room for a major destination art fair in Asia. There hasn't really been one to date with the exception perhaps of ShContemporary, which made some headway," said Magnus Renfrew, director of the Hong Kong fair.

"All the fairs that take place in Asia at the moment are very much rooted in the countries that they take place in," he added.

Hong Kong's zero import and export taxes for art, strategic Asian location and free flow of capital has already seen it become the world's third most important art auction hub behind New York and London.

Affluent Asian collectors have driven Asian art prices higher, and Renfew said Western art was now creeping onto the radar of top Taiwanese, Hong Kong, Korean and Chinese buyers.

"BRAND-NAME ARTISTS"

"The Chinese buyers are just beginning to get interested in the brand-name (Western) artists like Picasso and Damien Hirst," said Renfrew, citing Hong Kong's colourful property tycoon Joseph Lau who snapped up major works by Andy Warhol and Paul Gauguin.

For jet-setting collectors -- from New York hedge fund managers to Russian oligarchs -- who don't have the time to traipse through dozens of galleries, art fairs are an efficient way of buying art as well as an opportunity for networking and partying.

"Buying expensive art is kind of a lifestyle for them. It's like buying a very prestigious designer's condominium, or flying by private jet, or wearing Prada or Pucci, or sending their kids to Swiss boarding school," Misa Shin, director of Art Fair Tokyo, told Reuters in a recent interview.

"For the new rich people, if you want to belong to a certain social circle, the short cut is buying artists' work that belongs to that social circle," she said.

While the domestic Japanese market for contemporary art is still subdued, also because of weak economic growth, more and more buyers from other Asian countries are coming to Japan, where art is still comparatively cheap.

This year, Tokyo's highly influential Mori Art Museum is for the first time planning to buy artwork at 101TOKYO, which will run from April 4-6. This could encourage other buyers.

ShContemporary will follow up on the big splash it made last year with its hybrid East-West artfest, with a fresh fair slated for Sept. 10-13.

Recent auctions from London to Hong Kong have also shown that the global spending spree in the art market has not ended despite fears of a global recession.

Asia's new art collectors seek status, style and smart investments

HONG KONG, May 2, 2008 (AFP) - A pioneering art fair in Hong Kong is expected to attract 15,000 potential buyers, reflecting how modern art has become as desirable for many Asian consumers as the latest luxury-brand watch.

The fair, which opens May 14, will assemble 100 international galleries under one roof selling works ranging from Picasso masterpieces to prints by emerging local artists.

With the Asian art market booming, organisers hope the inaugural event will prove that owning art is not just for expert connoisseurs but can be hugely satisfying, and even profitable, for first-time buyers too.

Such an attempt to increase the number of collectors in Asia comes as the region's auction rooms enjoy unprecedented interest in contemporary art produced in Asia and elsewhere.

At the Sotheby's Contemporary Chinese Art sale in Hong Kong in early April, an oil painting by Zhang Xiaogang sold to a private Asian collector for more than six million US dollars, twice its estimate.

It was one of several records set during the sale, and was the highest auction price paid for Zhang, a successful artist from China who has exhibited around the world for 20 years.

"Contemporary art is developing into the ultimate luxury brand," said Magnus Renfrew, director of the fair, which will be held in the dramatic harbourside exhibition centre.

"A fair like this can be a fixture for the international jet set: somewhere people come to see and be seen.

"Many of the 'new rich' in China and elsewhere in Asia are now looking to contemporary art because they have their cars, their beautiful houses and yachts. So what's next to buy? What way can you next express your wealth?

"We're not seeing any weakness in the art market despite problems in the global economy, and the timing could not be better. We are expecting visitors from Taiwan, Korea, mainland China and Japan, as well as from outside Asia."

While a Picasso might still be beyond the means of most of Asia's newly wealthy, the Hong Kong International Art Fair has been carefully tailored to match their various wallet sizes and tastes.

The fair aims to cater for all budgets, with minimum prices of around 2,000 US dollars, while at the upper end of the scale one or two museum-quality pieces will add a touch of essential glamour and extravagance to the event.

The Picasso, a 1955 nude portrait, is likely to sell for several million dollars, while a Francis Bacon work from London's Marlborough gallery tops the price list at 35 million dollars.

A Damien Hirst "spot" painting and a 1962 Andy Warhol silkscreen could also fetch millions, organisers say.

"With so many top calibre galleries exhibiting a huge range of 20th and 21st century art there will be something for everyone," said Renfrew.

"If people are looking for a young artist whose work they might fall in love with, buying a piece at the fair should not be beyond them."

"People collect for a variety of reasons: to express their cultured nature, for passion, and for investment," he said.

-- "Buy for yourself -- and it should hurt financially" --

But David Tang, Hong Kong's most colourful businessman and a major collector of modern Asian art, issued some frank advice to profit-seekers as he welcomed the fair's launch.

"The art market is very economically sensitive," he said at his China Club in central Hong Kong.

"People should only buy if they love a piece so much that they feel they just can't live without it hanging over their bed.

"It is a wonderful feeling to own art you love. And it should hurt a bit financially: that means you really want it.

"I can't stand people who go into art just for investment," said Tang, founder of the Shanghai Tang fashion brand. "That is no longer art, it is just commodities and you may as well trade pork bellies or tin.

"Buy for yourself. The last thing you want to worry about with art is the price always going up and down."

Katie de Tilly's Hong Kong gallery 10 Chancery Lane will sell pieces for between 5,000 and 250,000 US dollars at the five-day fair.

She said the modern art market in Asia is in unchartered territory.

"So much has happened in the past seven years," she told AFP. "And the change seems to be getting faster and faster.

"There is a new generation of collectors looking to China, but also at contemporary art from Indonesia, Japan and Korea. Now Thailand seems the next exciting place.

"There are a lot of speculators out there, but at the same time there are many collectors. In such an evolving market we advise buyers to ask endless questions about the gallery, the market, the style and of course about the artist.

"Above all, spend a lot of time just looking at art. This fair will be a great opportunity to see what's out there, to research, and for people to find out what they like."

Art fair proves a hit with buyers and sellers
20 May 2008
South China Morning Post

The success of the inaugural Art HK 08 international art fair may pave the way for a bigger event next year, its organiser said yesterday.

But Magnus Renfrew warned that any expansion needed to be handled carefully to avoid creating an unhealthy bubble in what was still a developing market.

Some 102 galleries exhibited 850 artists from more than 20 countries during the five-day fair, which ended on Sunday. It attracted 19,185 visitors and a number of galleries reported strong sales.

Grotto Fine Art from Hong Kong, The Drawing Room from the Philippines and Gandhara Art from Pakistan reportedly sold out.

Among the significant sales was Seoul-based Gana Art Gallery's Untitled by Chinese painter Yue Minjun, which sold for US$1.5 million. Hong Kong's Art Beatus sold Yan Peiming's Portrait du Timonier No 7 for US$380,000. London-based Albion sold Xu Bing's Square Word Calligraphy for US$350,000.

Hong Kong-based 10 Chancery Lane Gallery also set a record with Cai Guoqiang's Gunpowderbook, which was snapped up for US$260,000 only 15 minutes after the fair opened.

Mr Renfrew said a mixture of works were bought by Hong Kong and mainland collectors, including works by Chinese artists and western art. "Some said photography isn't doing very well among Asian buyers but they did very well at the fair."

Mr Renfrew said he was also pleased with the high turnout of students and families.

"There are student groups and parents coming here with their children. It shows the fair is something culturally important for Hong Kong and there's a demand for major exhibitions of contemporary art."

He did not rule out the possibility of an expanded fair but said "we have to be very careful" to avoid unhealthy growth that could damage the developing market.

"This is a very young market and we have to make sure that it does not expand too rapidly," he said.

Ben Brown of London-based Ben Brown Fine Arts said he was pleased with sales and would be back at the fair next year.

"The fair has been very well organised and there was a very strong showing of collectors and potential collectors from Hong Kong," he said.

"The interest in art is fantastic and strong. The art scene in Hong Kong has been completely transformed in the last five to 10 years."

Mr Brown said that there was clearly a developing art market in the city. "Hong Kong will become a great artistic destination."

Hong Kong's Art Aspirations
The city wants to be Asia's culture capital, and ART HK 08, a glittering event of high-profile artworks and VIPs, may be just the ticket
19 May 2008
BusinessWeek.com

At Hong Kong's convention center overlooking Victoria Harbor, a large crowd gathers around local performance artist Li Wei as he shakes and wriggles in an effort to shed hundreds of mirror shards stuck to his body. Nearby, another Hong Kong artist, Movana Chan, shuffles her way through the crowd wrapped head to toe in a "body container" she knitted from shredded catalogues from luxury retailer Shanghai Tang and ArtAsiaPacific magazine.

When not focusing on Chan, hundreds of VIP guests, clutching flutes of Mot Chandon (LVMH) champagne, roam the floor for a sneak preview of contemporary art from every corner of the world. And in the VVIP section, the very special guests sit on white leather couches, nibbling seared tuna, Thai shrimp cakes, and filo with baked goat cheese, courtesy of lead sponsor Lehman Brothers (LEH).

Welcome to the opening night of ART HK 08, the city's first world-class art fair in more than a decade. Hong Kong officially brands itself "Asia's World City," and it has a lot going for it: superb infrastructure, an extraordinary skyline, beautiful countryside, and some of the best shopping and food anywhere. It has also long been a town whose denizens have unashamedly served Mammon -- and the relentless pursuit of material wealth has, to put it bluntly, turned the city into something of a cultural wasteland.

New Wealth Looking for an Outlet

Magnus Renfrew is trying to change that. If Renfrew, the director of the Hong Kong International Art Fair, has his way, the Special Administrative Region may establish itself as a major stop on the global art circuit on a par with London's Frieze Art Fair, Art Basel Miami Beach, and TEFAF Maastricht. After all, there's no shortage of buying power in the region: Hong Kong is the third largest art auction market after New York and London, according to Christie's, the world's largest auction house. Christie's sold $473 million worth of art in Hong Kong last year, compared with $2.67 billion in New York and $2.04 billion in London.

Contemporary artworks from China, Korea, and India have seen meteoric price gains in recent years. And, unlike the U.S., the E.U. or China, Hong Kong has no import taxes on art, making the city more attractive for both collectors and dealers. "It's an ideal location for an international art fair," says Renfrew. "The earth is tipping on its axis, and the economies of Asia and all the new wealth created means people are looking for different ways to spend their money."

Whether Hong Kong is ready to embrace Renfrew's vision will be revealed during the fair, which runs from May 15 -- 18. ART HK 08 features over 600 works from 102 galleries representing 20 countries from the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, and North America. There is $64 million worth of art for sale, including pieces from some of the top contemporary dealers.

Blue-Chip Works

London's Ben Brown Fine Arts is flogging an Andy Warhol silk screen of the 1962 Studebaker Avanti cars worth about $3.7 million, and crosstown rival Marlborough Fine Art is hawking a Francis Bacon work entitled Man at the Wash Basin with a list price of $34 million. There are also works by Damien Hirst, Picasso, and Robert Rauschenberg.

But while such blue-chip works from the West may command the highest prices, Art HK 08 also aims to cash in on the growing demand for Asian contemporary works from India, China, Korea, and Japan. More than 60% of the galleries are from the region, including 12 from Hong Kong and several from Shanghai and Beijing, featuring such hot-selling mainland artists as Zhang Xiaogang, Yue Mingjun, and Xu Bing. Other fast-rising Asian stars include Rashid Rana of India, Haris Purnomo of Indonesia, and Korea's Bae Joon-sung.

Hong Kong's gateway status is a big selling point for Max Lang, who brought works from his eponymous gallery in New York including an oil painting by Jean Michel Basquiat priced at $7.5 million, an oil by Keith Haring, and works by up-and-coming Chinese photographer Cui Xiuwen. "The art world goes where the money goes," says Lang. "There is lots of luxury and affluence, and this is a huge banking center, and high net worth and the art world go hand in hand. This whole area is inordinately wealthy."

A Shopping Mall for Art

Hong Kong isn't the only city in Asia trying to become an art hub. Tokyo hosted a similar fair [BusinessWeek.com, 4/4/08] last month. Shanghai is hosting one in September, and Singapore has one in October. Ben Brown, who runs the Ben Brown Gallery in London and participates in several other fairs in Dubai, Bologna, and Basel, says art fairs like these have become an indispensable part of selling art. "People can't be bothered to visit galleries anymore," says Brown. "It's like going to the supermarket vs, the butcher. It's a one-stop shopping mall."

But it's a shopping mall with cachet. Fair organizers say they aren't expecting ART HK 08 to turn a profit in its first year, and see their mission as educational as well as commercial. "Hong Kong's reputation as a cultural desert is both fair and unfair," says ART HK 08 adviser David Tang, the Shanghai Tang founder, who has the city's finest collection of contemporary Chinese art. "We hope it will make the Hong Kong community more artistically conscious."

That may take some doing in a town where on an average day the local branch of Madam Tussaud's receives more visitors than the Hong Kong Museum of Art. Renfrew hopes ART HK 08 will attract about 15,000 visitors willing to pay the $18 cost of admission, with lower prices for students.

First Step in Educating the Public

Hong Kong's political and business leaders are slowly coming to recognize that it is in their own interests to support Hong Kong's cultural aspirations. Aware that the arts play a big part in the quality of life and could improve the city's ability to attract and retain the best talent, the Hong Kong government early this decade designated a large plot of reclaimed land alongside Victoria Harbor as a new cultural district, following a master plan by British architect Richard Rogers.

Museums such as New York's Guggenheim and Paris' Pompidou expressed interest in teaming with local property developers to open branches there. However, after he took office in 2005, Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang scrapped the controversial proposal -- opposed by many locals who accused the government of making too many concessions to the developers -- sending planners for the district back to the drawing board.

So while the art fair is important, Hong Kong's ability to establish itself as a cultural hub depends largely on what will happen the other 360 days of the year in the city's growing number of private galleries. "People in Hong Kong have been trying to address the commercial desire of the market and don't take the higher road to educate the public," says Joanne Ooi, co-owner of Ooi Botos Gallery, which launched during the fair. "I am hoping to guide the market and show what it means to run an art gallery properly."

Arts hub The industrial area of Kwun Tong is attracting tenants of a creative kind
25 June 2008
South China Morning Post

Rising rents and rapid development have not dampened the creative spirit of a thriving community of artists, musicians and designers who have, since 2006, been setting up studios, galleries and performance venues in Kwun Tong's industrial blocks.

Among them is mixed-media artist Jaffa Lam Laam, one of the first artists to start using the ageing industrial area near Kwun Tong MTR station as studio space.

After graduating from Chinese University in 1999, she rented a 1,000 sqft workshop in the Sing Win Factory Building on Sing Yip Street with four other young artists.

"All of us lived in different areas in Hong Kong. Kwun Tong is the middle point that was convenient for all of us," said Lam, who now shares the unit with two artists.

The industrial area is crammed with hardware stores, allowing the artists to source all kinds of materials easily.

Sculptor Eddie Cheung Wai-sun shares a 500 sqft unit with a painter friend in the same building. "I chose to open my studio in Kwun Tong because the location was close to my home and the rent was affordable. Also, I knew that quite a few artists had their studios in the area," he said.

With more artists moving into the area, the art scene in this part of East Kowloon underwent a boom two years ago. According to Lam, more than 10 studio workshops were opened by different artists in the building at that time. In 2006, artists based in the area, including Lam and Cheung, organised an open day event called Leap - Local East-Kowloon Art in Progress, with six studio workshops set up in the Sing Win Factory Building alone. Meanwhile, the opening of a 7,000 sqft gallery, Osage, Contemporary Art Space, in mid-2006 also boosted the district's reputation as a growing alternative arts hub.

But hopes of an arts movement there were dented by the opening of the APM shopping mall, which not only heralded a new era in terms of development, but also drove rents up so drastically that many artists were forced to leave. Cheung said that rents for some units in the area had climbed about 20 per cent compared to 2006.

Figuring that rents would increase further in the future, half of the Kwun Tong artists moved to the Hong Kong Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre in Shek Kip Mei, a new arts complex which opened earlier this year in a previously abandoned industrial building.

"There was a pretty strong cohesion between different studios and artists in the [Kwun Tong] area. However, since many artists have moved out due to the rising rents, it's harder to get people together to organise events or open days now," Cheung said.

According to Lam, a part-time lecturer at the Hong Kong Arts Centre and Hong Kong Institute of Education, many young artists, such as her students at the art school, can't afford the rent anymore. "Now, there are more musicians and designers moving in."

In another corner of East Kowloon, hope still exists for an independent music scene. Live House, in Kwun Tong Industrial Building, is actively promoting live music in the area.

Opened in 2002, the 1,000 sqft premises has been turned into a popular 100-audience venue, hosting underground rock gigs and providing an ideal performing platform for the city's emerging young bands. Several studios have also been established by underground bands and musicians, such as Rhodi Sin Wai-hung and his fellow band members.

With their original studio in Ngau Tau Kok, they moved to Jumbo Industrial Building on Wai Yip Street, Kwun Tong, last year due to its convenience and nearby eateries.

"More bands and musicians are opening their studios in the area," Sin said.

"There are even buildings that cater for bands. For instance, in our building there are at least 10 studios."

He said the bands often visited each others' studios for jam sessions and networking, and some even arranged private performances.

"We've been to many places to look for the right location for our studio, but we think Kwun Tong is the best spot because of its transport as well as its developing music scene and atmosphere," Sin said.

"We hope we can keep operating in Kwun Tong."

Give 'em space
6 August 2008
China Daily - Hong Kong Edition

With the opening up of new galleries in the city, Hong Kong art scene is burgeoning. Old galleries are moving to bigger spaces or opening at new locations and more exhibitions showcasing works by both Asian and western artists are being held.

So where does this leave emerging Hong Kong artists?

Larger galleries are able to hold much larger exhibitions with more advertising and presence than the smaller trade-based galleries. Larger galleries are usually government-run, like the Hong Kong Museum of Art, and they seem to favor exhibitions of more traditional works, especially where Chinese art is concerned. While they showcase some beautiful works, they do little to support the local artists.

"For Hong Kong people, it was nice to see something other than Chinese art," as gallery owner Nicole Schoeni says, but it was more about increasing trade and sales rather than promoting Hong Kong artists, or art in Hong Kong. While there was a dedicated Hong Kong arts section, a reasonable portion of the international galleries brought their own pieces by non-Hong Kong based Asian artists or even works by western artists that echoed Asian styles.

Meanwhile, many established Hong Kong artists and gallery owners share the sentiment that the city has a lot of great artists but lacks good curators who can bring such talents to light and media attention they deserve.

Director of Grotto Fine Art Henry Au-Yeung says: "We lack good curators and curatorial positions that require the person to seek sponsorship and funding independently. Once he or she can get funding for their projects, the curator title will become a professional position rather than a part-time, hobby-like position." He adds, "if we don't have good curators here, we can bring from abroad... Once here, they can create several junior curatorial positions selected from local people to learn directly from these foreign curators."

Local artist Beatrix Pang says: "We need more creative, passionate curators and art event organizers who have experience and are keen to participate in various regional and international exhibitions or events, to link up the local artists and further exposing them to a more extended field."

However, Schoeni says: "We need a bit more government support." She said it would be great if the SAR government could build the West Kowloon Cultural District. Au-Yeung says: "I hope to see more 'serious' galleries for Hong Kong artists. There are many new ones but I don't believe in the so-called 'artist-run space' these days, because they lack practical skills to run business and they will not survive the city's astronomical rents."

Will emerging artists be able to access new spaces like the West Kowloon Cultural District as easily as the established artists, such as Chow Chun-fai and Wilson Shieh in Hong Kong? There are several large galleries and museums planned, but it is not clear how those could benefit lesser-known artists.

In Hong Kong most of the smaller and more diverse galleries are run for profit and are closed on Sunday, which is the ideal family day when parents don't have to work. There is another problem. Schoeni says: "The general public feels intimidated to come to gallery just to appreciate art. They think they have to buy it, actually it's more about enjoyment or getting inspiration or researching or educating themselves." However, local artist Simon Birch says: "With the commercial interest in art too there has been a rise in exposure to contemporary art."

There are smaller cafes, shops and bars that are willing to showcase local artists, and not just those in places like Fo Tan, but Hong Kong island including Epoch Cafe which has spaces in both Fo Tan and the trendy Star Street in Wan Chai. These modest locations provide local artists with a place to show their works, enjoy an opening show and perhaps invite some local press to the event. But even organizing an exhibition at a small location can be difficult. Artists can expect to wait several months for time slot and sometimes confirming a schedule can be difficult.

It is not always the artist who finds the organization difficult. Castel of Ka-pok says: "Sometimes I have to do a lot of work because the artists just come with their artwork and expect me to do the set-up and promotion. I want the event to be successful so I help, but some artists get angry because my services are not as professional as those of a gallery."

All this shows that there are local artists waiting to show their work, and that Hong Kong needs more dedicated spaces for such events, spaces that are not reserved on the basis of how much money could be made from sales. Schoeni says: "We have to organize more international programs." And there's still a lot to do in order to advance and develop the Hong Kong art - from educating the public and creating the culture of gallery-going, to providing more spaces. As summed up by Simon Birch: "There are definitely a few galleries who are trying to represent more challenging work... I see more of everything, whether tiny little group shows, new galleries, large productions in shopping malls or the recent and successful Art Fair. It's all good, and with the possibility of a huge modern art museum ahead of us, the art scene is only going to get bigger and more interesting."

Events organisers crying out for venues
8 September 2008
South China Morning Post

The renovations of the Queen Elizabeth Stadium and Hong Kong Coliseum might give events organisers more flexibility but, with an extremely high occupancy rate, they do not help ease the city's shortage of venues.

Concert organiser Florence Chan Suk-fun said the renovations would not solve the core problem. "Now we can only hope that the West Kowloon [Cultural District] has more venues of higher capacity so that more different kinds of shows can be staged here in Hong Kong," she said. "This is an international city and we need that."

The two venues have been popular choices for entertainment and cultural events, as well as sports events.

The Leisure and Cultural Services Department said that as of last month, Queen Elizabeth Stadium was 75 per cent booked to July next year. Sixteen per cent of bookings were sports events, ranging from ball games to boxing; 18 per cent were entertainment events such as pop concerts and talk shows; and 12 per cent were cultural events including classical and jazz concerts and ballroom dancing. The remaining 29 per cent were events such as school functions and seminars.

The Coliseum has been close to 100 per cent booked in recent years.

Ms Chan said that there has been a serious lack of performance venues in Hong Kong and, with the Coliseum closed for renovation, fewer shows have been staged.

"Hirers have already begun fighting over the schedule for next year. But it is time for the venues to be renovated," she said. "The Coliseum is ageing and there are a lot of mosquitoes."

Michael Roche, director of Lushington Entertainments, said these government-run venues had been in desperate need of upgrading, "particularly bearing in mind age, wear and tear over the years and the lack of reinvestment despite the extremely high rentals, posted by 20 per cent of the gross takings per show".

In the meantime, before the completion of any new venues, other privately owned indoor venues such as the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC) in Wan Chai, AsiaWorld-Expo near the airport, and Star Hall at the Hong Kong International Trade and Exhibition Centre in Kowloon Bay, remain in demand.

AsiaWorld-Expo's head of business development, Monique Yeung Wai-chung, said bookings had been strong for the past 21/2 years and the future was promising.

However, at the HKCEC - which will have its atrium expansion completed next spring - trade exhibitions were the priority. The HKCEC said the atrium expansion would increase the exhibition space but not concert seating.

Art world eyes upcoming HK sale for clues on price trends
26 November 2008
Agence France Presse

The art world is eyeing Hong Kong for the latest litmus test of how prices are holding up amid the global financial crisis, with experts cautiously upbeat about the future of the Asian market.

The frenzied scramble to own contemporary works has fizzled quickly as economic realities have started to bite.

London felt the chill in October when two big sales fell short of previous highs just a month after a record-shattering auction of works by Damien Hirst.

Earlier this month in New York, Sotheby's slashed prices for much-hyped contemporary art works and Francis Bacon's 1964 "Study for Self Portrait" failed to sell in a Christie's auction in the city.

At the beginning of October, Sotheby's autumn sale in Hong Kong, which included modern and contemporary Asian art as well as classical works, brought in 1.1 billion Hong Kong dollars (142 million US dollars), about half of the pre-sale estimate.

In a sale of modern and contemporary Asian art at the Sotheby's sale, 40 percent of lots remained unsold and the figures were even worse for 20th century Chinese art, with 65 percent of lots failing to find buyers.

Now attention turns back to Hong Kong, where Christie's is set to launch its five-day autumn sale from November 29.

Anders Petterson, managing director of London-based art market research company ArtTactic.com, said the contemporary art market has already corrected significantly since hitting peaks earlier this year.

"Prices have been adjusted down 30-50 percent depending on the work and the artist. This brings us back to 2006 levels, but prices are likely to have some time to go before we have reached an equilibrium. This will also depend on how deep the recession in the United States and Europe will become," he said.

"The correction we see in the Western art markets will spread to emerging markets, with both China and India already starting to feel the pinch.

"Upcoming sales in Hong Kong and in India will give us a better sense of the market sentiment."

Despite the barrage of gloomy economic news and the falling prices, Jonathan Stone, Christie's international business director for Asian art, remains upbeat about his upcoming sale.

"It's a slightly new world we're in compared with six months ago and I think we need to see where we are. I think overall I am cautiously optimistic.

"There are some very good works and I do believe that any time there are good works will always provide solid results," he said, adding that price falls could make it easier for collectors to come back into the market.

-- Asian art is now more affordable --

Stone picks out one of the highlights of the upcoming auction in Hong Kong as being a group of works of Chinese contemporary art from the collection of American filmmaker Oliver Stone.

Another star lot is Zeng Fanzhi's "From the Masses, To the Masses," expected to fetch about 30 million Hong Kong dollars.

For Hong Kong-based art consultant Kate Evans, it is difficult to predict which way the market is heading in the short term, although she presents a more nuanced picture of the scene.

"There is still a market for Asian art, albeit at much lower prices," she said. "Collectors' interest is expanding into much more affordable Southeast Asian contemporary art, particularly Indonesian and Filipino art."

This was shown at the Sotheby's October sale in Hong Kong, where the modern and contemporary Southeast Asian paintings sale was a high point.

In that category, Indonesian artist I Nyoman Masriadi's "The Man From Bantul (The Final Round)" sold for almost eight million Hong Kong dollars, a world record for contemporary Southeast Asian art.

Despite the bracing economic circumstances, Hong Kong gallery owner Katie de Tilly reports that business has been brisk in the past couple of months but adds: "We know it's going to slow down a lot."

The owner of 10 Chancery Lane Gallery said there was great value in works from countries such as Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia and that the Chinese market will remain strong in the long term.

She said the price correction was "a really great opportunity to buy because important works will always be important works" and there is more room to negotiate.

Evans, who runs the Art Radar Asia advisory firm, agreed, saying: "I believe there is a strong case for buying now because the long-term trends support an increase in value for Asian art in particular."

ArtTactic.com's Petterson is also positive, saying he sees "this as a time of opportunities, there will be less competition, less hype".

"The market will revert to focus on the art and its cultural and historical value and importance, so for the long-term player this is a buyer's market," he said.

Chinese art struggles at Hong Kong auction as slowdown bites
1 December 2008
Agence France Presse

Nearly half of the lots at the autumn Hong Kong sales of Asian and Chinese art by auction house Christie's failed to lure buyers, as the global slowdown took its toll on the previously booming market.

Only 28 of the 54 lots that went under the hammer at the sales of Chinese contemporary art and Southeast Asian modern and contemporary art were snapped up, fetching a total of 18.14 million US dollars, well below estimates.

Eric Chang, head of Christie's Asian Contemporary Art and 20th Century Chinese Art, insisted the results showed the resilience of the city's market.

The city's art sector has thrived in recent years as a hub for Chinese painting, which has fetched incredible prices as investors tried to cash in on a newfound international interest for the country's art.

"Against a continuing difficult financial backdrop, our sales... with active participation from collectors around the world, reconfirmed Hong Kong as the centre for contemporary and modern Asian art," Chang said in a statement after the Sunday sales.

Zao Wou-ki's "Hommage à Tou-Fou" fetched 5.86 million US dollars, the highest-priced among the lots sold and a world record for the Chinese artist.

The lukewarm response in the auction was contrasted with results of the auction house's rare wine sales on Saturday, which saw 93 percent of its lots sold at a total value of 4.07 US million dollars.

The star of the show was Château Latour vintages, which sold 98 percent of its lots. They included a world auction record for a Château Latour Vintage 1961, which was sold for 170,280 US dollars.

Major auction houses have started to hold wine sales in the city after Hong Kong decided to scrap wine duties early this year.

Sotheby's sells $89 mln of Asian art in Hong Kong sales

HONG KONG, April 8 (Reuters) - Sotheby's hammered off a total of HK$691 million ($88.6 million) worth of artwork in its spring Asian sales in Hong Kong, 11 percent higher than its pre-sale estimate in a steady showing for the fragile Chinese art market.

Its biannual Asia sales in Hong Kong, often seen as a weather vane for the Chinese art market, was characterised this time round by a far smaller, more realistically priced selection.

While demand was still weak for lesser objects, the appetite among buyers, especially wealthy Chinese, for top-flight items remained undiminished.

"We are delighted with the very healthy results that we have achieved, and they send a very positive and encouraging signal to the market," said Kevin Ching, CEO for Sotheby's Asia.

Bidding was strong in the "Eight Treasures" sale, with the European-sourced collection of imperial porcelain fired in the kilns of Jingdezhen, completely sold off.

In particular, a pear-shaped reticulated celadon vase, with the seal mark of the Qing dynasty Qianlong period, sold for $HK47.7 million ($6.1 million), a world auction record for Qing Monochrome porcelain according to Sotheby's.

"For that sale I think the prices were strong ... and prices were totally on a par with what you'd expect from about a year ago," said Nicolas Chow, the head of Chinese ceramics and works of art at Sotheby's.

In Chinese ceramics and works of art however, there was inconsistent demand across the board with 44 percent of 54 lots unsold, while a rare set of Ming furniture fared poorly.

"There were a number of things which were selectively decided to be over-estimated or under quality," said James Lally, a top dealer based in New York who was at the Sotheby's sales.

"But whenever anything really came up that was good, it was a battle," he told Reuters.

"Sotheby's timing was impossible. They had to gather this sale four or five months ago when everybody was absolutely in the doldrums. Fine things are (still) in strong hands," Lally added.

For paintings, demand was firmer and more consistent in more traditional areas including 20th Century Chinese paintings and Fine Chinese paintings. They have proven far less volatile than the once white-hot Chinese contemporary art market that has cooled with the global downturn.

A handful of Chinese artists broke world auction records including 20th century master Lin Fengmian's rare oil painting "Fishing Harvest" which fetched HK$16.34 million ($2.1 million), a world auction record for the artist at auction.

Zhu Yuanzhi's "The Last Supper" sold for HK$6.02 million ($770,000), also a world auction record for the artist.

Sotheby's inaugural Hong Kong wine sale over the weekend raked in HK$49.9 million ($6.4 million). It was 100 percent sold by lot, reflecting cheaper pre-sales valuations and solid demand for top vintages among wine collectors in Hong Kong, which is positioning itself as a regional wine hub.

Solid start to Hong Kong art fair despite downturn

HONG KONG, May 16 (Reuters) - A burgeoning international art fair in Hong Kong aimed at tapping Asia's growing pool of contemporary art collectors, has shown positive signs of shrugging off the global economic downturn.

The event -- the Hong Kong International Art Fair or ART HK 09 -- is seen as Asia's answer to major international art fairs such as Art Basel in Switzerland and Frieze in London.

Hong Kong has been trying to position itself as Asia's cultural capital, and is now the world's third most important auction hub for Asian artwork, behind New York and London.

Spread throughout a cavernous hall in Hong Kong's convention centre overlooking the city's sweeping harbour, a slew of big-hitting art dealers have been lured out this year including New York's Gagosian Gallery and London's White Cube.

Sprinkled among the 110 galleries from 24 countries are an array of works including "walking" minimalist LED nude sculptures by Julian Opie; raw, whorled, wood carvings by David Nash; lurid Chinese contemporary oil paintings by the likes of Yang Shaobin, haunting plastic dolls by Korea's Jin Young Yu, and a silver sculpture by Damien Hirst with a price-tag of 1.5 million pounds.

Despite recent signs of weakness in the global art market amid the financial downturn, there were a number of notable sales at ART HK 09 including a large Gilbert & George "Gingko" picture bought by an Asian collector for 325,000 pounds ($492,800).

TOP QUALITY

"We wanted to bring top quality examples by our artists to introduce them in the best possible way to a new market," said Graham Steele, with the White Cube gallery which sold the Gingko piece, along with several works by Damien Hirst.

Steele said he was pleased so far with the gallery's first foray out to Hong Kong, but said the market for Western contemporary art in Asia and China still needed time to mature.

Meanwhile, in another bright spot on the fair's sidelines, Korea's leading "Seoul Auction" house hammered off a Damien Hirst work called "Tranquility" for $1.7 million, that it said was a record for any Hirst work auctioned in Asia.

London's Lisson Gallery meanwhile sold a batch of works by multi-media British artist Julian Opie -- including an LCD screen display of Mt. Fuji for 55,000 pounds and silk-screen portraits.

This year's fair is slightly larger than last year's inaugural event which drew some 20 thousand visitors.

Magnus Renfrew, the fair's organiser, said the number of visitors had exceeded his expectations so far, and included "high rollers, big spenders, culture vultures, VIP's" and other leading figures in the international art world.

For those with more modest budgets, the fair offers works starting from $1,000. ART HK 09 runs in Hong Kong until Sunday.

Other upcoming Asian art fairs include ShContemporary in Shanghai to be held in September, and ArtSingapore in October.

ABSTRACT
May 28, 2009
A City and a Fashion Empire Come Together Over Art
By ALEXANDRA A. SENO

HONG KONG — Much to the chagrin of the authorities, locals have long called the Hong Kong Museum of Art “the bathroom building.” Pink tiles, similar to those used on public toilets, cover the exterior of the boxy, harbor-front structure, built in 1991 by the government’s architectural services department.

For “Louis Vuitton: A Passion for Creation,” a contemporary art exhibition sponsored by the luxury brand, Richard Prince wrapped the complex in brightly painted vinyl. Its retro, book cover-inspired images — taken from “After Dark,” one of the best known series by the American artist — are rather more eye-catching.

At a moment when Hong Kong has been passionately debating the next steps toward creating the West Kowloon Cultural District — a taxpayer-funded project budgeted at 21.6 billion Hong Kong dollars, or about $2.8 billion — this exhibition, which runs through Aug. 9, highlights the obstacles and opportunities in the city’s grand ambition to become an internationally recognized cultural center.

See whole article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/arts/28iht-vuitton.html?ref=world

Christie's Asia art sales reap $137 mln, mood lifts

HONG KONG, May 27 (Reuters) - Auction house Christie's sold a total of $137 million worth of Asian art in its spring sales in Hong Kong, above pre-sales estimates, a sign the firm and dealers said would lift sentiment in the Asian art market.

Christie's had expected to sell $97 million for its four-day Hong Kong spring sales, but the offerings were pared back substantially from a year ago, and conservative valuations helped drum up demand.

Eighty percent of the 1,600 lots were sold for a total of HK$1.07 billion ($138 million). In the fall sale, 70 percent of the lots sold to half-empty auction halls.

The highlight of the auction series was the sale of more established categories of Chinese art, including imperial Chinese ceramics, which saw healthy bidding for top lots.

A record HK$45.4 million ($5.86 million) was paid for a pair of gilt-bronze "dragon" ritual bells from the Kangxi reign, which had been expected to sell for a third of that amount.

"There's a palpable sense of optimism and a change in mood from the end of last year," Christie's CEO Edward Dolman told Reuters on the last day of the sales.

Both Christie's and Sotheby's hold biannual Asian art auctions which are seen as a barometer for the market.

"We're not seeing much weakness, nor much downturn for high quality pieces of Chinese art," Dolman said.

"MARKET STRONGER"

Other top lots included a Qing dynasty Amphora-form vase that sold for $3.8 million and a "Tianqiuping" celadon-glazed vase that fetched $3.4 million.

"The market gets stronger and stronger. There's more and more Chinese getting involved. Look at the room, 90 percent were Chinese," said Richard Littleton, the New York-based dealer who bought the ritual bells.

Despite the optimism, a third of lots went unsold in the Chinese ceramics and artworks sale, with buyers unconvinced by aggressive valuations for cheaper, lower-quality works.

Rivals Sotheby's sold $88.6 million of art in Hong Kong in April, slightly above expectations, in a scaled-back auction.

Demand in contemporary Asian art overall was patchy, however, with a quarter of works unsold.

The works of a batch of emerging, more cheaply priced, Asian artists set new auction highs, but the works of blue-chip Chinese contemporary artists such as Zhang Xiaogang and Cai Guo-qiang were well off previous highs.

The abundance of Chinese bidders suggested Christie's row with the Chinese government over the Paris sale of two bronze animal heads, looted by foreign troops in 1860, had not overshadowed the sales, despite calls for a boycott.

Their sale in February stirred up strong nationalistic feelings in China, and sparked protests from Chinese cultural officials who imposed restrictions on the sourcing of high-end relics in and out of the country by Christie's.

The Chinese collector who bid successfully for the works later refused to pay.

Galleries put on world-class shows
The Standard
Monday, October 24, 2011

Given the success of the city's commercial art scene, perhaps it's time to explore why this has become so.

Indeed, what can be found within Hong Kong's abundance of art galleries is a vast range of both different art and exhibition strategies.

Three of the best galleries may be found in the Pedder Building, a prime location in Central.

Gagosian Gallery puts on museum-caliber shows, which serve as a platform for internationally renowned and critically important artists and artworks.

Ben Brown Fine Arts holds an impressive inventory, bringing to the SAR some lesser known names, including a wonderful collection of German photography.

Hanart TZ Gallery is committed to showcasing the most important Chinese contemporary art, bridging the gap between the East and West.

Despite the presence of such top galleries, there are others that put on much more challenging exhibitions, helping to nurture the local creative talent.

Gallery EXIT often represents young emerging artists who showed potential in their graduate courses, and acts as a springboard for their future artistic careers

Grotto Fine Art has also made a name for itself by exclusively representing local Chinese artists - i.e. Hong Kong contemporary art with a focus on the newest and most avant- garde artworks.

Then there's the Cat Street Gallery, and the adjacent The Space Gallery, which is dedicated to promoting contemporary Australian art; and Edouard Malingue Gallery, which, like Gagosian, showcases museum-quality works with a focus on impressionist and modern art.

These galleries - whether highlighting wide ranging artists, or having a more specific exhibition remit - all contribute to an active, interesting and intellectually stimulating commercial art scene.

This has significantly helped promote the city as one of the world's top art hubs - of course, along with the annual Hong Kong Art Fair. Hong Kong Art Vanguard Association members - architect Nicholas Ho and art historian Stephanie Poon - don't always see eye to eye.