Hong Kong Impressions

Erscheinungsjahr 2020
ISBN: 978-988-19493-3-2
Verlag: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press

Buch, Englisch, 200 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 210 mm x 280 mm

Cultural conventions shaped landscape preferences, perception of landscape, and what historical and cultural meanings and values were attached to particular landscapes. Hong Kong Impressions features works of art that were created based on specific sites in Hong Kong, offering us an entry point from which to understand the complex relationships between landscape aesthetics, modern tourism, and the visual representations of the Hong Kong landscapes.

The artists included in the exhibition were landscape tourists who conducted extensive tours all over Hong Kong and visualised their travel experiences and perceptions of Hong Kong in pictorial forms. In the postwar period, the rise of site?specific paintings with themes on Hong Kong landscapes reveals a connection between a growing interest in plein air sketching and a rapid development of modern tourism in Hong Kong. From a place with ""little to do"" to a popular tourist destination, the development of tourism in Hong Kong demonstrates how a specific ideology and landscape perception can become imbued in the travel discourse over time.

In the pre?war period, Hong Kong's tourist attractions were selected and constructed through an Oriental lens, aiming to emphasise the contribution of the British government in transforming Hong Kong from the 'barren hill' into the 'Pearl of the Orient' and frame the city as modern yet traditional, Western yet Chinese. After the wars, the contributions of the Chinese cultural elites to the discourse of tourism added a nationalistic perspective to ways of looking at Hong Kong scenery, expanding the list of scenic attractions of Hong Kong and shifting the focus of scenic attractions from the Hong Kong Island to the New Territories.

As such, Chinese landscape aesthetic helped to develop a particular landscape sensibility towards the Hong Kong picturesque landscapes. In the process, some attractions were privileged and became the symbolic signs of Hong Kong, becoming popular subjects in site?specific paintings. From the selection of 2 scenic spots and artistic styles, to specific vantage points from which to view and frame the scenic sites, the paintings in the present exhibition advance our understanding of how artists contemplated and imagined Hong Kong, bringing us a new way of seeing and experiencing the Hong Kong landscapes through an artistic lens.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Künstlerische Stoffe, Motive, Themen Künstlerische Stoffe, Motive, Themen: Natur & Tiere (Stillleben, Landschaften etc.)
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunst, allgemein Ausstellungskataloge, Museumsführer
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunststile Asiatische Kunst

Über Autor(innen)

Prof. Pedith Chan is a senior lecturer in Asian arts and cultures at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. She received her PhD in Art and Archaeology from SOAS, University of London. Before joining SOAS, Chan was an assistant professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Her research interests focus on the production and consumption of art and cultural heritage in modern and contemporary China. Recent publications include The Making of a Modern Art World: Institutionalisation and Legitimisation of Guohua in Republican Shanghai (Leiden: Brill, 2017), “Learning from Nature: Modern Tourism and Site?Specific Landscape Painting” (National Palace Museum, Taipei, 2020), and “In Search of the Southeast: Tourism, Nationalism, Scenic Landscape in Republican China,” (Twentieth?Century China, 2018). She is currently researching the making of scenic sites in modern China.

Prof. Josh Yiu is the Director of the Art Museum, The Chinese University of Hong Kong. He received his B.A. in Art History from the University of Chicago, and completed his doctorate at Oxford University. From 2006 to 2013, he served as the Foster Foundation Curator of Chinese Art at the Seattle Art Museum. At CUHK, he has supervised over thirty special exhibitions, acquired over 400 artworks, digitized the collection, launched online education programs, and initiated the museum expansion project. A scholar in late imperial and modern Chinese art with over twenty publications in books and articles, he also serves as an advisor to the Hong Kong Arts Development Council and international consultant to the National Art Museum of China.