Imagining Hong Kong: Four Visions of Island Landscapes in Ink and Color

EVENT DESCRIPTION

Imagining Hong Kong: Four Visions of Island Landscapes in Ink and Color invites four young ink artists from Hong Kong— Chan Kwan Lok, Sam Cheng, Shum Kwan Yi, and Ross Yau Wing Fung—to present their interpretations of Hong Kong’s landscape, characterized by its various islands, peninsulas, and land surrounded by sea. They have employed techniques rooted in Chinese painting tradition, including ink and color, plain line drawing, and meticulous fine line and color. This exhibition can be seen as a continuation of the 2017 Picturing Hong Kong exhibition at the University Library. While the previous exhibition focused on artists’ unique depictions of Hong Kong’s scenery, this exhibition encourages them to explore their subjective perceptions, observations, and imaginations of Hong Kong’s distinctive landscapes, reflecting on the relationship between personal creation, ink art tradition, and the inspiration drawn from nature.

Landscape (shanshui) became the dominant subject in Chinese painting during the tenth century, when the diverse natural sceneries of the North and South inspired various masters to develop original styles and techniques that responded to their regions’ varied geographies. As artistic schools emerged and techniques were passed down through generations, themes such as following one’s heart, emulating the ancient masters, or learning from nature became central to how artists defined their creative path. From Mi Fu’s notion of “painting as a product of mind” in the Northern Song, to Dong Qichang’s assertion in the late Ming that “each brushstroke should have its own lineage” and questioning “How could one abandon ancient methods to create something entirely new?” to Shitao’s declaration that “Mountains and rivers made me their spokesperson… I draft by collecting extraordinary peaks” and “I use my own method,” the creative philosophies of different artists across various periods reflect their individual emphases and pursuits. In the early twentieth century, the pressures of modernization in China and the influence of Western painting shifted artists’ focus to critical issues such as the preservation or transformation of traditional painting and the rejection or integration of Western artistic traditions. This led to increasingly complex identities in artists’ creative positioning.

Entering the twenty-first century in Hong Kong, the debates surrounding tradition versus modernity and Chinese versus Western influences are no longer pressing issues. For the artists, choosing traditional ink painting as their creative medium is now a personal decision, allowing them to explore its various styles or techniques without the burden of preserving national culture or the anxiety of whether to adopt Western methods to improve Chinese painting. The four participating artists are all graduates from university art programs, where they received comprehensive training in both Chinese and Western art history and techniques. Mastering the brushwork traditions of classical Chinese painting serves as a solid foundation for their innovative departures. When considering how to depict the landscapes of Hong Kong, where they were born and raised, should they follow their hearts, emulate the ancient masters, or draw inspiration from nature? These questions, once contemplated by ancient painters, seem to resurface in the artists’ creative exploration, now infused with new meanings.

The incorporation of Hong Kong’s scenery into Chinese landscape painting gained significant momentum in the 1950s and 1960s, as traditional painters from the mainland turned their attention to their new home and discovered the city’s scenic beauty. This sparked a vibrant trend of landscape sketching in Hong Kong. As residents deepened their emotional connection to local culture, various hiking activities and sketching tours, along with exhibitions celebrating Hong Kong’s landscapes, have flourished to this day.

The focus of the four participating artists, however, is not on sketching from nature, nor do they concentrate on iconic views or landmark attractions shaped by tourist culture. Instead, they depict places where they have lingered, hidden corners of nature encountered during their hikes, cherished observations of locations preserved as fragments of memory, or perceptions of Hong Kong’s islands and seas that have been segmented and reconnected. The artists aim to transcend previous perspectives, merging their subjective imagination and emotions through a personal lens, thereby offering viewers a fresh visual experience of Hong Kong’s landscapes.