Reviews & Articles

墜落，卻非鴿子回京 | A fall, but the pigeons don’t return to Beijing
John BATTEN
at 3:08pm on 25th February 2019

圖片說明Caption：

1. 嚴瑞芳在油街。Yim Sui-fong in Oil Street.
2. 北角電車總站附近長椅上的鴿子。Yim Sui-fong in Oil Street; pigeons on a bench near North Point tram terminus.
圖片: 約翰百德 Photo: John Batten

(Please scroll down for English version)

當香港術家嚴瑞芳請我為展覽會圖錄撰文時，我提議不如邊走邊談，說說香港近期的社會、政治和社區環境改變。我們的討論，會成為她短片作品《墜落如羽》簡介文字的基礎，作品將於3月在北京一群展中亮相。

我們由北角油街出發，沿著英皇道看看街上老店，經過皇都芬蘭閣入口處後轉往舊皇都戲院的地庫，探望各位令這座標誌性建築地標豐富起來的招牌製造商、裁縫、理髮師、鞋店和裝修承建商。踏上鄰近唐樓的樓梯，我們欣賞由綠色水磨石鋪成的漂亮地板。然後在電車的叮叮響聲之中穿過北角街市，再乘坐小輪到土瓜灣。在這裡喝過咖啡稍息後乘小輪返回港島，再乘巴士到銅鑼灣和中環。

嚴氏以錄像、攝影和裝置為藝術焦點。她的攝影作品和個人故事去年榮獲「WMA 大師攝影獎」。在《大門沒有上鎖》這個關於她家人的作品中，她探討了一個已荒廢單位內的歷史文物，再呈現曾經在香港出現過的合作樓故事。她最近的短片作品入選了「香港人權藝術獎2017」，題材是一個象徵故事，以1997年慶祝香港回歸時放出來鴿子作主角；這些鴿子本應飛回內地，但卻因為那個星期的惡劣天氣在香港迷路滯留！

在她的藝術生活之間，嚴氏是「天台塾」的聯合創辦人。這個由藝術家營運的非牟利機構位於灣仔的創意社群「艺鵠」。有別於歐洲、美國和中國內地較常見的公幹與駐留藝術家機會，「天台塾」致力促進社區及亞洲藝術參與，過去兩年為香港藝術家舉辦了駐留計劃，也讓中學生與與日本、菲律賓、泰國、台灣和越南的藝術家配對，建立香港的地區亞洲藝術連繫。

嚴氏的最新作品《看管時間的人》延續了她WMA項目的其中一點。它最初是一本關於嚴爸爸的攝影和文字集，資料來自研究與訪問嚴爸的親友和舊同事。嚴氏發掘了父親「非常普通的生活」，從中找出那些在1940至1950年代以新移民身份在香港生活人士的典形故事，就像我們可以輕易在每個以移民建立的城市中，發現幾乎每個家庭都有其白手興家的故事一樣。

嚴爸爸在1971至2000年間，在北角油街前政府物類供應處工作了29年，這個地方現時已成了長江的大型發展項目，小角落處是一座歷史建築，前身為香港皇家遊艇會會所原址，現在則是康樂及文化事務署轄下的「油街實現」藝術空間。嚴氏追踪父親的生活，由他最初居住的大坑道木屋區、到他在前紐約戲院當帶位員、電車司機和餐館侍應等工作，到後來在油街物料供應處任看更的政府長工。她以歷史照片表達了香港作為殖民地的過渡性，把焦點放在油街是英國政府機器的齒輪，以此說明香港（通常）有效的發展，以及其父的社交活動。在作品的下半部，她走過父親當年在柴灣的家出發上班的路。這些近期的紀錄片式照片與昔日舊照重疊，是其父可能見過和遇上的類似景物和人物的當代紀錄。

前身為油街政府物料供應處的用地，也是香港藝術社群的傳奇之地。政府於1998年關閉貨倉，把空間以低廉租金作短期放租，馬上吸引了許多藝術家和藝術團體的興趣，看到在這裡設立工作室和藝廊的機會。藝術社群很快在這裡有機地演進形成，其後兩年也相當活躍。有趣的地方，是嚴爸爸和他「非常普通的生活」和工作地方，跨越了香港的政權移交，也見證了1990年代末香港藝壇的復興時期。後者是今日藝壇的前奏，也是他女兒現在積極參與的領域。我們大部份「普通人」的生活，往往都不會被記錄，然而，也正是同一群人令歷史上錯綜複雜的故事更富深度。

嚴瑞芳的錄像作品《墜落如羽》以前英國首相戴卓爾夫人1982年在人民大會堂摔倒的一幕來暗喻人生挫敗。她的錄像剪輯了表演者同時在香港不同地方墜下的片段，旁白由表演者講述感受，以及與表演和歷史先例相關的想法。戴卓爾的一跌在社會、政治和歷史上均具重大意義，標誌著殖民時代香港回歸的談判正式開始。

2019年的香港、1982年的北京：不同的年代，但卻無可避免地被社會及政治歷史連繫起來。現在，就讓我們寫好那段北京展覽用的文字！

展覽詳情：
此地有獅
主辦：北京798文化創意產業投資股份有限公司
時間：2019年3月22日-5月21日
地點：798當代藝術中心（畫廊周北京2019“新勢力單元”）

參考資料:
www.yimsuifong.com

原文刊於《明報周刊》，2019年3月2日

A fall, but the pigeons don’t return to Beijing

by John Batten

When Hong Kong artist Yim Sui-fong asked me to write a piece for an exhibition catalogue, I suggested instead we walk and chat about Hong Kong’s recent social, political and urban environment changes – our discussion would be the basis for the text to accompany her video, Fall Down, to be shown in a group exhibition in Beijing in March.

Our walk started at Oil Street in North Point. Then following King’s Road we visited older shops and just past the entrance to King’s Sauna we entered the basement of the old State Theatre to see sign-makers, tailors, hair-dressers, shoe shops and building contractors, who make this a much richer place than just an iconic architectural landmark. Climbing up the staircase of a nearby tong lau, we admired the beautiful green terrazzo staircase. We then walked through the North Point street market amidst the ding-ding of the trams and caught a ferry to Tokwanwan. We stopped for a brief coffee before returning by ferry, then caught a bus to Causeway Bay and Central.

Yim’s art focuses on video, photography and installation. Last year, Yim was awarded the prestigious WMA Masters Award for her photography and a personal story, The Unlocked Space, about her family - which she explored through historical artefacts found in an abandoned flat, and a wider story about Hong Kong’s co-operative housing. A recent video was a finalist in the Human Rights Arts Prize 2017: it is the symbolic story of pigeons released during the celebrations of Hong Kong’s return to the mainland in 1997, supposedly to then fly back to the mainland, but became disorientated and stayed because of that week’s terrible weather!

In between her artist life, Yim is one of the founders of the non-profit artist initiative Rooftop Institute located in the creative community of Art & Culture Outreach (ACO) in Wan Chai. With a commitment to community and Asian art engagement, Rooftop has for the past two years organized residencies for Hong Kong artists and secondary school students paired with artists from Japan, Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan and Vietnam to build Hong Kong’s regional Asian art links – in contrast to the more usual official travel and artist residency opportunities in Europe, USA and China.

Yim’s latest project is The man who attends to the times – which continues an aspect of her WMA project. It is, initially, a book of photographs and text about her father, following research and interviews with relatives and his former work colleagues. Yim unearths his “very ordinary life” and “tease(s) out tales which were typical of those who lived through the 1940s and 1950s as a migrant here – just like how we could easily discover a rags-to-riches story in nearly every family in a city (built) on migration.”

Her father worked for 29 years, between 1971 to 2000, at the old Government Supply Depot on Oil Street in North Point, now a large Cheung Kong development, with a small corner of heritage buildings, formerly the original premises of the Hong Kong Yacht Club, now the Leisure & Cultural Services Department’s Oi! art space. Yim tracks her father’s life, from the squatter area in Tai Hang where he first lived, his jobs as an usher at the old New York cinema, as a tram driver and restaurant waiter. And, then, his permanent government job as a watchman at the Oil Street depot. She presents historic photographs of the “transitory nature of Hong Kong’s colonial existence” focusing on Oil Street as a cog in the British administrative machine, and as an example of the (generally) efficient development of Hong Kong and her father’s social activities. In the second half of the project she walks the same routes her father supposedly made from their later home in Chai Wan to work. These recent documentary photographs are an overlay of the past, a contemporary record of similar scenery and people whom her father may have seen and met.

The former Oil Street government supply depot is a legendary place for Hong Kong’s arts community. After its closure as government warehouses in 1998, these spaces were cheaply rented out on short-term leases. Immediately, many artists and arts organisations saw an opportunity to set-up studios and gallery spaces. An organic arts community quickly evolved and was active for the next two years. Remarkably, Yim’s father and his “very ordinary life” and work place straddled both Hong Kong’s change in sovereignty and as witness to the late-1990s renaissance of Hong Kong’s art scene – the precursor of what it is today and of which his daughter is now an active participant. The lives of ‘ordinary people’ - the majority of us - are usually unrecorded, but nonetheless it is these same individuals who give depth to history’s intricate stories.

Yim Sui-fong’s Fall Down is a video that uses British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s fall on the staircase outside Beijing’s Great Hall of the People in 1982 as a metaphor for personal failure. Yim’s video shows performers spontaneously falling-down at different locations around Hong Kong, while the voice-over has performers explaining their feelings and ideas related to the performances and its historical precedent. Thatcher’s own fall was at a moment of social, political and historical significance as negotiations for colonial Hong Kong’s return to the mainland began.

Hong Kong in 2019, Beijing in 1982: different times, but inevitably linked by social and political history. Now, let’s tackle that text for this Beijing exhibition!

Exhibition details:
hic sunt leones*
date: 22 March to 21 May 2019
venue：798 Art District (Gallery Weekend Beijing 2019 "Up & Coming Sector")
*on mediaeval maps dragons or lions were often drawn to denote dangerous or uncharted land, thus leading to the Latin phrase ‘hic sunt leones’ or ‘Here be Dragons’