CULTURE CAPITAL

From world-class museums to dynamic art galleries, discover the artistic side of Hong Kong with these arts and culture experiences

- By Hashirin Nurin Hashimi

After a half-hour drive from Tsim Sha Tsui, we arrived curbside at one of the high-rise buildings in Fo Tan, an industrial area in the New Territories, north of Kowloon in Hong Kong. We took the lift up and when the doors opened, we found ourselves in a dimly-lit corridor with a slightly metallic odour in the air. “Please watch your steps, the floor is slippery,” our host said. We slowly made our way down the corridor before we arrived at the studio of Trevor Yeung.

The artist later shared that next-door is a factory processing pork products, and at times there may be pig carcasses in the corridor. In recent years, artists like Yeung have taken over such industrial spaces in Hong Kong—and there are a number of them with studios in the same area—creating their own creative communities, just as homegrown galleries, including Yeung’s representatives, Blindspot Gallery, have taken over the old factories and warehouses in Wong Chuk Hang, another industrial district on the southside of Hong Kong Island.

Stepping inside his studio, a different scene welcomed us. In the sun-dappled room, with big windows overlooking a mountain view, Yeung cultivates various plants, alongside a collection of crystals, lighting fixtures, and objects related to aquaculture and others from the natural world. “As you can see, I collect a lot of objects,” the artist said. “I used to have more plants, but since I’ve been travelling for work, how I get to keep them is to ask someone to help me water them. Some of the plants here are succulents and cacti, so I don’t have to water them every day.”

These objects, however, are not mere decorations, they are an integral part of Yeung’s artistic practice, from where his inspiration stems, with some making it as part of his multimedia installations. The China-born and Hong Kong-based artist often finds metaphors for human relationships within aquarium systems, lighting configurations, horticulture, and botanic ecology.