Moving Art Installation

Our tram for the next 25 minutes or so, with the upstairs covered up

This afternoon I had a chance to see some art on a tram.

Called Twenty five Minutes Older, not much is told ahead of time, except that visitors can either take the tram from Sheung Wan to Causeway Bay or from Causeway Bay to Sheung Wan, a ride that takes approximately 25 minutes.

Although almost all the free tickets were snapped up, the artist, Kingsley Ng let me ride at one of the times with fewer people, which happened to be today at 4.20pm.

Kingsley Ng explaining the proceedings

However, when I got there, the tram was experiencing delays thanks to the rainy weather and so I and about 10 other people waited patiently under cover.

From the outside, the tram looks like any other, but the upstairs is covered up. We entered the ground floor, and Ng was there explaining the situation: When we went upstairs, it would be very dark, and no photography, mobile phones or flash were allowed at all. The actual piece would be about 15 minutes long and we would arrive at Wan Chai or Causeway Bay.

Then we were each handed a pair of headphones, that at first had sounds of ocean waves. Then we went upstairs and saw the windows were covered up and almost all the seats were taken out; there were some cushions on the floor so I sat down on one of them. When we settled in, the lights went out and a series of phrases were projected in Chinese and English, while music played in the background.

We then started to see a view of Central and I recognized the shops as we went by, but they were upside down and in black and white. What was going on?

Periodically we'd hear a woman's voice speaking poetic phrases that didn't seem to add up to much, but I was more entranced by the images we were seeing in front of us.

Looking through the pinhole camera on the tram

When the lights finally went up, Ng explained the images we saw were in real time, projected from a camera obscura that was actually right next to me. He wanted to show that things we see are fleeting -- that we cannot record them because they are gone.

Perhaps it was a message to tell us to stop and metaphorically smell the roses, to not always focus on capturing things for posterity, but to remember the moment.

Our trip ended in Wan Chai and the rain was coming down in buckets.

Twenty five Minutes Older is running until June 2, as part of "The 5th Large-Scale Public Media Art Exhibition: Human Vibration", presented by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council.

Another work that was part of this show was the large light installation on ICC that got yanked after the ADC claimed the two artists changed the title of the work without consulting it or the curator.

One of the panels adding context to Ng's tram installation

But many believe it was turned off because the pair explained after the work was launched, that the large number on the ICC was actually the number of seconds counting down to July 1, 2047, when "one country, two systems" ends.

While watching the seconds countdown was daunting, being in the tram with a few people and experiencing the same thing was a memorable and intimate way to experience art -- moving art -- that also made you think about how we spend our time, and that it that will never come back.

Twenty five Minutes Older by Kingsley Ng

www.25mins.info

Lights Out for Multilayered Art Installation

The large number on ICC counts down the seconds to July 1, 2047

I saw it last week, albeit briefly, and was hoping to see it again.

But alas, it's gone for good.

I'm talking about a curious light installation on the ICC or International Commerce Centre at Kowloon station.

For a few days it had a countdown clock, not like the one Japanese artist Tatsuo Miyajima did.

Two Hong Kong artists, Sampson Wong Yu-hin and Jason Lam Chi-fai created a work originally called Our 60-Second Friendship Begins Now, where, following a series of messages, like "I will remember this minute", and "You can't change this fact", and a bunch of graphics, it finally shows a large number counting down.

The installation was launched on May 17, the start of Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the National People's Congress' visit to the city. Did he see those messages from his presidential suite?

It turns out, explain Wong and Lam, that the big number is the number of seconds to July 1, 2047, when "one country, two systems", or 50 years of supposedly no change ends and Hong Kong becomes... what? Another Chinese city? In no-man's land?

What was amazing was that Lam and Wong were able to pull this off, if only for a few days.

But now it's been revealed that the pair made the installation, that was supposed to run until June 22, thanks to a commission by the Hong Kong Development Council. But the government-run arts body is very angry about the true meaning behind the work, claiming it was duped into thinking the light show was politically correct.

In a statement, Ellen Pau of the HKADC and Caroline Ha Thuc, curator of the "Fifth Large-Scale Public Media Art Exhibition: Human Vibrations", said:

"The disrespect demonstrated by Mr. Sampson Wong and Mr. Jason Lam against the original agreement and understanding made with the curator and HKADC is jeopardizing our profession and put at risk any future possibility to work further in the public space."

The statement said the artists had made changes to the work and had publicized these "without consulting the curator nor HKADC." On May 18 after after the exhibition's opening ceremony, the pair changed the name to Countdown Machine.

It also added, "We do believe in the freedom of artistic expression and do support our artists."

Err, those last two statements contradict each other. If you support artists and their right to artistic expression, then what is wrong with their installation?

The HKADC isn't without controversy -- local artists have told me that it picks and chooses artists it likes -- in other words, those it deems to be politically correct. This body has the power to promote artists to a global audience, and so some artists make compromises for the chance at recognition.

Others decide to just go their own way, but most of the time end up struggling.

Wong alluded to this in his Facebook page in response to his light installation being taken down.

"The public knows clearly who is jeopardizing the [arts] sector and the profession," he said, referring to a line in the HKADC's statement that it said he and Lam were "jeopardizing our profession".

He added that Hong Kong had not yet accepted the behaviour of "calling a deer a horse" -- referring to the distortion of facts.

Lam and Wong know they have probably ruined their chances of a fruitful artistic career in Hong Kong. They've probably been labelled "subversive" and blacklisted in the mainstream art world and are probably lumped into the same category as Joshua Wong Chi-fung, who can't even open a bank account these days.

However we salute these two for not only bringing the attention of Hong Kong's relationship with the mainland, possibly getting high visibility from a senior Chinese leader, and highlighting issues with the HKADC in one piece of art.

Multilayered meanings. Isn't that what art is about?