Graphic roots
The origins of Chinese painting are closely linked to the invention of writing. Chinese calligraphy, an integral part of everyday life, is at the heart of Asian art, along with traditional painting. Emperors and commoners alike collected works of calligraphic art. These works are created using the "four treasures of the scholar's study"(wen fang szu pao): brush, ink, paper and inkstone. Calligraphy is glued onto scrolls or framed and hung in living rooms and study cabinets. They can be found everywhere: on store signs and administrative buildings, on monuments and steles.
Artists began to create images illustrating life at court. At the same time, individual efforts stood out, such as Gu Kaizhi (Gù Kǎizhī ) around 344-406.
Under the Ming dynasty (1368 - 1644), the style of painters of the Wu school became more expressive. Under the Qing dynasty (1644-1912), three groups coexisted: those who transcended tradition by developing an individualistic style; traditionalists who reinterpreted ancestral models; and court artists. From the 18th century onwards, trade and commerce encouraged cultural exchanges with America and Europe.
Today, as in the past, calligraphers are often both scholars and artists. Their work consists of their own writings, poems or correspondence. In the small, out-of-the-way streets of Sheung Wan, or in the Song dynasty village in the Middle Kingdom of Ocean Park, some practise their art under the admiring gaze of tourists.
Modern art
A first wave of Hong Kong painters fusing Chinese and Western modes of expression emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. Lu Shokun and Wang Wuxie, for example, mixed Western expressionist techniques with those of traditional painting. Similarly, Hong Kong designers have the particularity of integrating painting into design. A meeting point for the world's cultures, Hong Kong is an invitation to innovation, whether in methods, materials or concepts.
Lin Tianxing, a famous painter born in 1963, and President of the Hong Kong Art Association, feeds off the East-West artistic atmosphere that reigns in Hong Kong. This mixed spirit permeates the imagination of all artists born or working in HK. According to him, this is characterized by the absence of limits and the breadth of the field of possibilities.
Since the late 1980s, Lin Tianxing has decided to move away from the Chinese pictorial tradition. He turned to Western pointillism to break with classical composition. His style of the mid-1990s is characterized by ink blots, colors and straight lines. Then he reproduced Hong Kong scenes, articulating them in a surrealist mode to convey the vitality of the urban center. After a stay in Tibet, the lotus marked the third major period of his career. A symbol of eternity and nobility, the lotus flourishes even in mud. All different, his lotuses reflect life, with its obstacles and joys.
HK Walls
This land of skyscrapers, multicolored neon lights and wide-open natural spaces inspires visiting street artists as much as those who live here. All styles have their place here. Hong Kong's streets are a breeding ground for international artists. Among them are China's Senk, Thailand's Rukkit, England's Dan Kitchener, Russia's Pasha Wais and Japan's Shingo Katori. On the French side, Elsa Jean de Dieu has painted a famous mural in homage to Brazilian and Japanese cultures, as well as many others for the MayArt Festival and HK Walls. Our national Invader is very much at home in HK, with no fewer than 130 pixelated works on the streets. In the Wan Chai district, Baptiste Droniou has founded L'Epicerie Fine Art, dedicated to the promotion of urban art. Here, you can visit exhibitions and commission projects.
The street-art wave in Hong Kong took off with the HK Walls festival in 2014. Since then, every year, artists return to embellish the facades of avenues and the more discreet walls of alleyways. And their creations remain. To discover them, a tour begins in Sheung Wan, the cradle of street art. It continues in Kowloon, where an entire building has been covered in frescoes by Spaniard Okuda San Miguel. The disused warehouses of Wong Chuk Hang are also a popular playground for urban painters. Explore Central, the business district, Wan Chai Sai and Soho, one of the liveliest neighborhoods. In Soho, the graphics of the Hollywood Mural will dazzle you, as will the Uma Nota wall painted by Elsa de Jean De Dieu and the fish on Shing Wong street.
Traditions and modernity intermingle in Sai Ying Pun, at ArtLane, a project run by a property developer to promote street art in Hong Kong.
Street-art in Macau
Art lovers, in this creative and colorful city, step away from the luxury hotels and casinos to explore the historic districts. Contemporary art can be enjoyed outdoors in three districts: Rua do Cunha. A vibrant street in Taipa Village, in the south of Taipa Island, where art and authentic street food await you! Another Macau district, close to the superb beaches of Cheoc Van and Hac Sa, Coloane Village, with its Portuguese fishing port ambience, is home to frescoes in its narrow alleys that stretch across entire intersections. The third destination, Praça de Ponte e Horta, still hosted a street-art festival in 2017. There are still some superb works signed by great graffiti artists. When the stores' iron curtains come down, an open-air exhibition is revealed!
Macao Art Scene
The "Art Macao" biennial is an international art event. The event features 30 exhibitions scattered across the city. Dedicated to modern and contemporary art, it features works by over 200 artists from some twenty countries.
On the official side, the Art Museum of Macau opened its doors in 1999. It features a permanent collection and temporary exhibition rooms, presenting traditional Chinese art with sculptures of celebrities and dignitaries. Don't miss the photography collection, which combines documentary views of the city's emergence with artistic visions of contemporary Macau.
Hong Kong's contemporary scene
The pioneering Hong Kong Museum of Art opened in 1962. The city's first public art museum now features collections of Chinese antiquities, local modern art, traditional painting and calligraphy.
Hong Kong is experiencing an explosion of artistic life in the 21st century. An influx of art spaces characterizes the historic districts of Central and Sham Shui Po, as well as the West Kowloon Cultural District. At the heart of the Asian art scene, Art Basel Hong Kong has been bringing contemporary art to the forefront since 2010. The internationally renowned event brings together renowned artists and gallery owners from all over the world.
The city now boasts cultural centers, exhibition venues (PMQ, Fringe Club) and museums such as the Hong Kong Museum of Art and the brand-new M+. Designed by Herzog & De Meuron, this prestigious museum of modern and contemporary art is located in West Kowloon, the cultural district by the sea. It showcases contemporary visual culture, design and architecture from the 20th and 21st centuries. Swiss collector Uli Sigg donated the most comprehensive collection of Chinese art to M+, with 1,463 works listed. The site also houses 33 galleries, stores and restaurants. Overlooking the waterfront.
The vast Tai Kwun site in the heart of Soho has been restored for cultural purposes. Since 2018, this emblem of local heritage has been the stage for an eclectic program of visual arts.
Ultra-contemporary art
HK is unique in that it has rapidly become the Eldorado for artists from elsewhere. In the auction rooms, the share of local contemporary artists is only 30%. The city acts as a lightning success gas pedal for very young artists. Those who reach extraordinary heights could never have hoped to achieve such success in their own countries, wherever they come from. The art market is overtaking those of London and New York, the historic strongholds of tomorrow's talent.
Most of the new stars of the painting world are foreign artists. Sweden's Camilla Engström, born in 1989, is presented by her gallery owners primarily in Hong Kong, where her canvases, with their acidic palette and dreamlike, surrealist accents, delight collectors. The style of British artist Jadé Fadojutimi, born in 1993, is also characterized by a colorful palette, where emotions and pigments are inseparable. Her monumental "emotional landscapes" are expressive weavings in a single space, fields of color delineated with broad brushstrokes. American Lucy Bull, born in 1990, paints like a marathon runner in long painting sessions. Her psychedelic abstractions easily top the million-dollar mark.
Chinese-Canadian artist Matthew Wong, also featured at Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum, is attracting buyers. In Hong Kong, his painting River at Dust fetched an astronomical $6.6 million. His fantastic landscapes, with their tumultuous, colorful brushstrokes, are expressive and reminiscent of the Dutch genius. Somewhere between traditional Chinese painting, Soutine and pictorial poetry, Matthew Wong invites us to explore the materiality of visual art.
