Hong Kong Art: Culture and Decolonization

Hong Kong Art is the first comprehensive survey of contemporary art from Hong Kong presented within the changing social and political context of the territory’s 1997 handover from British to Chinese sovereignty. Tracing a distinctive and increasingly vibrant art scene from the late 1960s through the present, David Clarke discusses a wide range of media, including painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installations, as well as other kinds of visual production such as architecture, fashion, graphic design, and graffiti. Clarke shows how a sense of local identity emerged in Hong Kong as the transition approached and found expression in the often politicized art produced. Given the recent international exposure of mainland Chinese contemporary art, this book considers the uniqueness of the art of China’s most cosmopolitan city. With a modern visual culture that was flourishing even when the People’s Republic was still closed to the outside world, Hong Kong has established itself as an exemplary site for both local and transnational elements to formulate into brilliant and groundbreaking art. The author writes about individual artists and art works with a detail that will appeal to artists, curators, and art historians, as well as to postcolonial scholars, cultural studies scholars, and others.