Heritage and Home in Hong Kong’s Hidden Places: Perspectives from Wing Lung Wai with Hong Kong Sign Language

PARK CHAN-WOOK: (Korean) Something that brings me so much joy is when I hear the audience burst into laughter during an international screening of my films.

For me, humour is a critical element, so I put a lot of thought into making sure it’s delivered just right. From the start of the filmmaking process, I consider what might be universal in humour and can be understood by international viewers. I also examine whether this humour could be understood by viewers in the future, in Korea or beyond, generations from now. Some humour may be hilarious now, but might be met with yawns in ten or twenty years. That’s why I check to see if the humour would translate for both global audiences and future Korean viewers. I also take great pains to make sure subtitle translations are done well. I literally sit with the translator to review every word.

‘Geum-ja, what brings you here at this hour?’

‘I need an advance on my salary’

‘No advances’

This scene is a prime example of humour lost in translation. It features a hilarious pun in Korean that is impossible to translate, so it completely loses its effect. So when seeing that the audience got the joke, I know the overall message delivery was successful. That’s how difficult it is for humour to overcome cultural and linguistic barriers. Making genre films is my standard practice. Whatever story I imagine the default mindset I have is to begin within the conventions of a genre. I’ve never worked on anything, just for the sake of commercial success or box office numbers. I always think about whether the work can be truly satisfying from an artistic or creative perspective, constantly rethinking and editing until I get closer to what the audience would enjoy.

But when it comes to the PARKing CHANce project, I purposefully departed from my usual approach to create films that no longer conformed to genres. One of such films is the short film ‘Night Fishing’, which isn’t one of my more well-known works. My younger brother and I shot the film entirely on an iPhone 4. It’s a film that constantly surprises the viewers through its originality and reflects its rootedness in Korean culture.

In the world of filmmaking creating hierarchy based on age or years of experience is meaningless. We are all colleagues and equals that can help one another and fill in gaps for each other, it can be a great process. I regularly provide support to the film directors that I work with, but I also ask them to read over my screenplays and seek to receive their advice. It’s a give-and-take process. By having discussions with those directors, I learn so much from them. We all learn so much from each other. I gain an expanded perspective that I wouldn’t be able to if I trapped myself in my own little world. This is what I hope these directors feel, too

AZUSA MURAKAMI: We aim to create an experience that really evokes the feeling of being immersed in nature.

Hi, I’m Azusa, and this is Alex, and we have a studio called A.A.Murakami.

ALEXANDER GROVES: We love working with these ethereal materials, such as bubbles which, of course, float but also because it refers to the Japanese woodblock prints that are called ‘floating world’ for a kind of Buddhist saying or interpretation of a sorrowful world, but also they refer to a kind of release from the strict social hierarchies of everyday lives.

AZUSA MURAKAMI: Beyond the Horizon is a work that we have been working on and developing for many years, it really is the most ambitious and complicated project that we have done to date. It’s really working on the edge of what’s possible and creating a totally new experience.

This installation creates a cloudscape much like those depicted in Asian art and how they’re symbolically connecting the earth with the celestial world.

ALEXANDER GROVES: One of the things that we’re particularly interested in is the origins of life on Earth. And so, the idea was maybe the earlier cells actually formed inside bubbles, and the first cell walls were actually the bubble skin, and then they evolved to become cells. We’ve got these giant bubbles that drift through the space. We were, of course, thinking about these like early first emergence of life. These bubbles, they can feel kind of alive when they emerge from these machines because they’re in a hypnotic dance of waves across the surface.

So we take something like a bubble filled with mist, and then we have to figure out how we’re going to approach engineering such a device to do this. And that is where a huge amount of R&D comes in. You could blow a bubble with your mouth, but actually making a device to autonomously do that to feed it with the soap liquids, to do the precise movements to make something so delicate time and time again. That actually requires a huge amount of complication and sophisticated kind of technology. That’s maybe where it gets interesting.

AZUSA MURAKAMI: The Passage of Ra is an installation that explores the interplay between fleeting moments and lasting permanence, and it’s inspired by the Egyptian mythology where the sun god Ra travels through the underworld each night to rise again at dawn.

ALEXANDER GROVES: I spend too much of my life on a screen, and if I’m experiencing technology through something on a screen, it’s existing in a different dimension to myself. It’s in a dimension that can’t age that can repeat perfectly again and again. I think subconsciously, or perhaps consciously, you’re aware that it’s not in the same physical realm as you. There’s a feeling that you get when you’re experiencing nature like the cherry blossom season, for example, where there’s this melancholy and an enhanced sense of beauty from the transience and the awareness that you’re both experiencing this moment together, you and the blossom, and it will never come again.

So we’ve always been really drawn with a fascination to materials. I think that’s how we also approach technology. I think technology doesn’t necessarily have an interesting materiality you get from materials that can actually bypass language and it’s to do with tactility and probably primordial things that our brain is tuned to... responds to in our natural world.

AZUSA MURAKAMI: So we always try and create a very immersive environment in our work and that was very inspiring to us, how it could create a scene that was beautiful and real. You can experience it when you’re there but when you’re gone, you just have a beautiful memory of it.

MOVANA CHEN: (Cantonese) Paper isn’t just a piece of paper. When there’s a blank sheet, you need to give it a story.

I am Movana Chen. I grew up in Hong Kong. Why did I become an artist? I never thought I would become one. But during the SARS epidemic, my dad’s company had to close down and relocate to mainland China. As I helped him to shred company document, I got the idea to take a magazine I liked, shred it and knit the shreds into a dress. That was my first artwork, and how I started [my journey as an artist] .

The ‘Body Container’ series began in 2005. I created over 10 pieces for the series, each using a different material. More recently, in 2021, I created a new work. The inspiration was ‘questioning the line’. During the Covid lockdown, I noticed symbols on the pavements, a human figure or a circle [indicating] one is forbidden to overstep the line. Human interaction all over the world came to a stop. In ‘Body Container’, there’s a two-metre distance between the figures. It explores why we need to keep two metres apart from others. I moved to Portugal in 2021, and began creating this piece shortly afterwards. I hadn’t finished knitting this piece at the time. I invited a performer I had just met in Portugal to take part, his name was Francisco. I also asked a photographer I had met in Los Angeles, named Tyler to join us. The three of us rented a camper van, and went on a 23-day trip starting in Portugal. It felt as if all places were calling us, yet we, the performer and I, were just in the stillness inside the sculptures. The sculptures could be worn, they were shredded maps knitted together, an exploration of the human-nature relationship.

The work ‘Knitting Conversations’ is about interpersonal interaction and participation. All the materials and locations, everything about the work is related to people. In the many years since I first began this work. I met some very special people. For instance, I went to Korea, Milan, Tel Aviv in Israel. When you weave others’ stories into your work, every stitch carries the stories of many. The participants were aged 3 to 80, even my paternal grandma was involved. All the materials were donated by friends. I collected them from people around the world maps, dictionaries, books. They gave me their personal belongings. I shredded then transformed them, wove them together, connecting them to other people. These people didn’t know each other, but through knitting, they’re now in a close-knit situation. My works do not have endings. They’re perpetually ongoing.

The latest extension of my projects is map-knitting. First, Hong Kong maps then maps belonging to friends from all over the world. It’s a new project titled ‘A Home for All’. The project began in Hong Kong. In the next decade, it could turn into a larger version of ‘Knitting Conversations’, ultimately involving some 1,000 or 10,000 participants. This is just the start of the journey. It will tour the world. I will modify a vehicle, an old camper van. It will be my studio home on the road. I’ll put ‘A Home for All’ and 10 to 20 knitting needles in the van, as well as works already begun here. Other people will join in along the way, I’ll produce a video about this project and a photodocument. I’ll collect stories from different people, write down their names and contact information, keep in touch with them.

If I do all my knitting in a studio, I’ll lose connection with the real world. When I go outside, I see people in the flesh and interact with them. The richness of the work will always be there.

GUO PEI: (Mandarin) How does an artist find inspiration? From your life, from your approach to life, passion for life, all of life’s experiences.

I was born and raised in Beijing. I studied in Beijing. When I was little, my maternal grandma always told me that in her youth, she could embroider butterflies and flowers onto clothes. What she told me became a goal I pursued in my career something I aimed to achieve. I began studying fashion design in 1982. It’s been 40 years. I’m a designer who’s particularly fond of traditional craft. Many say Guo Pei’s embroidery is top-notch. There’s no fast lane in craftsmanship. There are no shortcuts. Can it be mastered overnight? No. It has to accumulate over the course of your life and time. Like a painter’s mastery of paints, a musician’s mastery of notes. For me, my mastery of garment-making is no different from any artist’s mastery of their art. Craftsmanship is crucial. Without it, you can’t even express your ideas.

I founded Rose Studio in 1997. Having a company means I can hire embroiderers to put the patterns I want onto garments. I started out with one or two, then eight or 10, then a hundred. The most we had was close to 300. In the detail of my works, you can see our exploration of traditional culture and commitment to it, as well as our efforts to uphold the legacy allowing it to shine and foster creativity.

Many people have noted my works’ embodiment of Eastern and Western cultures. Many are curious. How do you integrate Eastern and Western cultures? Eastern culture is like my blood. It runs in me. It’s like my language. I often use it in my patterns, our palettes. It’s a manifestation of our traditional culture. Western culture sparks my curiosity. It attracts me, charms me into exploring it, into trying to understand it. I use my language to narrate what I’ve seen in the West. Hence, the integration happens naturally. I never make clear distinctions between the two.

Drawings offer a direction. But the creative use of materials in the process, the craftsmanship you have to make every detail speak for itself, then you have to bring all the details together in harmony and perfection. It requires decades of experience. I think haute couture is also contemporary art. It’s one manifestation of contemporary art. Contemporary art cannot be divorced from the times. Haute couture is a product of its time an artistic expression. As a fashion designer, I naturally hope to engage in dialogue with the world through my works to have mutual exchange with more people. The collections I created have names that call to mind musings on life enlightenments. I hope the details in my work will make people think. My career has spanned almost 40 years, I believe these works will bring the memories of contemporary humanity into the future.

(Original language: Cantonese)

HUMAN WU: Today, I’ll take you on a stroll through Central, following the subjects depicted in the paintings of local artist Wilson Shieh. Shieh grew up on Hong Kong Island and witnessed Central District’s transformation.

The landmarks here, such as Jardine House, the HSBC Main Building Bank of China Tower and IFC, naturally became the subjects of his paintings. Shieh studied architecture at HKU for one year, but he discovered his artistic inclinations. He then switched tracks to pursue fine art at CUHK. His artistic practice focuses on traditional Chinese painting while also incorporating modern elements.

He painted a series of ‘skyscraper ladies’ blending classical gongbi techniques and contemporary style.

How did he combine crisp architectural contours with the graceful delicacy of traditional feminine figures? Shieh transformed the features of each building into evening gowns of different styles.

For example, in Cheung Kong Center against Bank of China, the two skyscrapers wear gowns with different patterns. Who is this small figure beside them? It’s the former French Mission Building. It housed the Court of Final Appeal between 1997 and 2015. Back then, it was hidden behind the Hilton Hotel, which is now the site of Cheung Kong Centre. When constructing Cheung Kong Centre, an urban square was designed. This architecture can be seen completely by the public.

In Hong Kong City Hall sits at Connaught Road, the four ladies are positioned just like the arrangement of the four structures behind us. Between the AIA Central and the Hong Kong Club Building lies the now-demolished Ritz-Carlton Hotel. It closed down just one year after this work was created.

The City Hall in the painting appears as a fashionable woman. She wears a simple chequered mini skirt showcasing a modernist style. Back then, the colonial government wanted to bring this trendy, simple, yet functional style to Hong Kong to establish a new image for a new era. City Hall was the first world-class multi-purpose cultural centre in Hong Kong. It was declared a monument in 2022, becoming the city’s youngest monument. However, Queen’s Pier and the fourth generation of the General Post Office nearby faced a different fate.

In HSBC and Friends, everyone wears an evening gown except the HSBC Main Building. If you have been to the HSBC headquarters, you might recall its unique open atrium. It creates a public space in the urban landscape offering, the precious ground-level space to citizens. Buildings in the city are situated among neighbouring structures and serve the public. A good architectural design considers both the city and its people as top priorities.

LOK WONG: [Cantonese] Hello, today we’re at Montane Mansion in Quarry Bay. Montane Mansion is actually one of five interconnected buildings [that form this complex]. Together, they are: Oceanic Mansion, Montane Mansion, Fok Cheong Building, Yick Fat Building and Yick Cheong Building.

From above, the five buildings form an E-shaped complex with shops at the podium level and mixed-use units inside the buildings. The complex is a world unto itself providing residents with the facilities that fulfil their basic needs. Looking up from the courtyard, the five densely packed buildings become an intimidating leviathan. The intricate rectangles occupy every space within sight resembling a spreadsheet waiting to be filled in. Today, the Eastern District has transformed into a diverse community where Grade-A offices and old tenement buildings coexist.

Montane Mansion’s unique structure stands in stark contrast. It attracts many creative workers who use the complex as a source of inspiration to create artworks.

In the M+ Collections, ‘Circus’ by American abstract artist Mark Bradford references Montane Mansion. Its creation is based on layered architectural drawings and urban landscape images resemble an infrared thermography image of a building with red and green lines. Although this work has a futuristic composition, the combination of bright red and olive green evokes the imagery of traditional handmade signs and window grilles of old tenement buildings. Bradford often reconstructs urban cityscapes through techniques, such as collage, sanding and spray painting. The artist metaphorically portrays the five buildings as a colourful circus. On the surface, it’s a world with an endless variety of experiences, but, behind this facade, there is a potential source of conflict. This work is a tribute to the unique aesthetics of Hong Kong and a reflection of hidden social issues, as Montane Mansion and other buildings have developed in a haphazard way.

German photographer Michael Wolf lived in Hong Kong for a long time, and used Montane Mansion as his subject. His practice focused on documenting urban life in Asia. In his work, ‘Architecture of Density, No.119’, he trimmed the sky and the podium of Montane Mansion turning the complex into a 2D pattern, [Through Wolf’s lens] the horseshoe structure is flattened, losing its boundaries. You may wonder ‘Could this structure extend endlessly?’

What does Montane Mansion mean to local makers? This Hong Kong 4As poster by Hong Kong designer Sandy Choi, features the Montane Mansion as its background. In the black-and-white inner courtyard

there is a unit painted with hot pink and written ‘Relieve Constipation at Flat 4A’, the text ‘Flat 4A’ symbolises the ‘HK4As’ referring to the Association of Accredited Advertising Agencies of Hong Kong. Aimed at encouraging industry creativity, this award doubles as a cure for ‘creative constipation’. The hot pink colour of the poster also resembles the colour of memo notes which some creatives use for brainstorming. Through the designer’s alteration, Montane Mansion becomes a local symbol of our haphazard yet utilitarian way of doing things.

Other than these objects from the M+ Collections. Montane Mansion is also frequently captured in works by other local and international makers of moving image works. This unique architecture gradually permeated diverse visual art mediums and served as a microcosm of the city.

As someone living in Hong Kong, how do the different ways of looking at our city inspire you?

SOUTH HO SIU NAM: (Cantonese) Hello! I’m photographer South Ho.

We are now in Tin Shui Wai. I’d like to take you to some of the locations, where I created the ‘Every Daily’ series ten years ago.

Around 2007, I moved to Tin Shui Wai. In the more than ten years that I lived there, I often photograph around the town. From 2012 onwards, I began to reflect on the relationship between the town and myself. One significant discovery was that when cleaning up my home, I stumbled upon the brushes left behind by my father. We moved to Tin Shui Wai after he passed away for a fresh start. I tried to combine his interest in painting and my photography, to see if it would make any difference to my art practice.

I started to experiment with drawing squares on the sky portion of the photographs. How did I come up with this idea? It’s because I saw the Light Rail trains passing by the same spot at the same time every day. Light Rail trains always run along with their rails. It makes me think that when a city is very well-planned, does it restrict the lifestyle of its residents? The ‘Every Daily’ series draws on this concept. ‘Every Daily’ is about thingsthat happen every day. How does a pattern begin? Is it predetermined by an architectural design or urban planning?

If you have seen my work ‘Every Daily 26’, you’ll notice that the pond captured in this work is the dried-up pond behind me. There was a buffalo sculpture in the pond. The most interesting part was that there was a rope tied on the sculpture. I found this a peculiar yet intriguing scene in the city. Returning today, I found that the pond had already dried up. It’s also interesting that the city kept changing in the past decade, and the buffalo sculpture is long gone.

From this hill where we are now, this place is not only a popular morning exercise route for nearby residents, but also a great spot for watching sunset and taking a walk. You can see the neatly arranged residential buildings in Tin Shui Wai. Back then, these areas were mostly fishponds. These buildings did not exist until the 1980s. Today, the town has become a well-established community. But at the same time, you’ll notice that the other side of the townis still rural and undeveloped.

In this town, in addition to the high-rises that we often see, there are also areas for other uses, such as for industrial purposes or container yards with large machinery. Therefore, it has a dynamic cityscape with many gradations between the urban and rural. When you continually observe what is going on, you will naturally gain fresh insights. You’ll also realise Hong Kong’s cityscape isn’t that monotonous. Besides high-rises, there are other constructed and natural features. For many people, this kind of cityscape is truly fascinating. It’s neither like scenic spots, nor tourist attractions, but it’s shaped by the diverse living environments of people in Hong Kong.

ALAN YEUNG: (Cantonese) Hello! Today, I would like to introduce a video work in the M+ collection. It's called Central, created by the French artist Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster in 2001.

The protagonist plans to meet with her brother at Star Ferry Pier. Whilst waiting for him, she goes to Kowloon Public Pier to observe the strangers. Like her, those strangers are fascinated by this liminal space. Not daring approach them, she looks at their backs from far away and riding on the mere spark of resonance between them, imagines their inner worlds, their longings and fear

Year 2001 is 23 years ago. Twenty-three years, as a timespan, is sort of subtle. It can mean the coming of age or passing of a generation. But personal memories from 23 years ago can feel vividly alive. The Tsim Sha Tsui Waterfront Park and the public pier upon renovation have changed thoroughly. But the ferry in the shots and the views of Hong Kong Island apparently look just the same.

Our fantasies shall one day pass as memories and our memories can in turn trigger imaginations on the future.

Back then, what was the thing that moved the artist? Was it the visual stimuli brought by the concrete jungle, or the rhythm of the Harbour’s waves and the sailing ships?

Probably, it’s just like what the protagonist says: it's the moisture and stench in the air.

“Looking at a landscape like an immense face. It’s perhaps a disappearance. Trying to decipher the future. As if it were a rainy day”

TINA PANG: Today we’re at Victoria Harbour and we’re going to look at two projects from the M+ Collections. They take us back in time and look at different histories of the city, its representations and the nature of travel.

The first project is Henry Steiner's branding for a short-lived helicopter service, called Hong Kong Air, launched in 1970. In 1970, when Hong Kong Air was established, the only way to get from Hong Kong Island to the Kowloon Peninsula and back was by ferry. Following the opening of the cross-harbour tunnel in 1972, Hong Kong Air suspended its scheduled airport service at the end of 1973. But what is remarkable in few short years that it operated, it carried over 96,000 passengers.

Henry’s design is dominated by a vibrant orange and yellow colourway, bold sans-serif typography and a sharp logo that can be read both as a runway and the ‘H’ of Hong Kong Air. In contrast to the bold graphic style that Henry chose for the overall branding of Hong Kong Air, he decided to look back to the past for a set of postcards he produced for the company as souvenirs. The image of Hong Kong's as Victoria Peak rising up out of the harbour is one that traces its roots to an image from the 19th century in a painting made largely for an audience of foreign traders or tourists. It is this history of travel commerce, adventure and representation that Henry Steiner drew upon for the set of postcards.

The second project is a series of photographs of Hong Kong taken by the Japanese photographer, Nobuyoshi Araki, on a visit he made to the city in 1997. Araki’s unique style of photography can be spontaneous and unplanned intimate and confessional. In April 1997, Araki made the unusual decision to travel to Hong Kong. He spent five days here. Although he was used to staying in Tokyo and remaining in Japan, photographing the life around him. This decision would change his life and change his career forever. The series of photographs that Araki made while here. They're like a diary of a journey, taken over 5 days between the 16th and the 20th of April. In them, Araki captures in his impressions of a city on the cusp of uncertain change, particularly the intensity of the humid atmosphere in Hong Kong. As being charged with a kind of eroticism, like meeting a woman for the first time. In his tender, intimate portraits, he captures the city and its inhabitants a little unawares and a little obliquely subverting the idea of photography as souvenir.

Through Henry Steiner's branding for Hong Kong Air and Araki’s photographic travel diary, we’re invited to travel back in time to imagine the harbour as it was in the past and to anticipate the transformations to come.