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State of the Arts
JOAS
Hong Kong is well known as a centre of trade, industry and finance. Can it one day also become one of culture and the arts, which have undergone a boom in recent years? Robin Hutcheon, in this article, looks at the past and present and offers a prospect of how it might evolve in future. Editor
TRANSFORMING majestic forests and lush jungles into arid deserts is one of the more deplorable human achievements of the 20th century.
Hong Kong, in its unending quest to set new records, is busily reversing the process. Not ecologically, but culturally.
Where is the desert, pray?
Don't bother turning to an ordinary map for it won't be shown, though if you turn to the end page of this Annual Report, you will see its regeneration graphically illustrated.
It's what we used to call the great cultural desert. And like the Gobi in northwest China, it would blow its stinging, accusing sands into our myopic eyes, daring us to take up the challenge.
For in the years gone by, Hong Kong's rare cultural achievements were listed as endangered species - dying through neglect.
Today, the desert is fast disappearing, and luxuriant concrete and glass edifices are sprouting in the many barren cultural sand dunes that none but the most intrepid artistic explorer once ventured to visit.
The newest and most sumptuous will be inaugurated in November 1989 on the site of Hong Kong's first railway station. For, in its finishing stages is the lavish $513-million cultural complex, High Kirk of the Performing Arts, with seating for 4 500 in its three facilities, with a museum of art and surrounding gardens, together with appropriate car parking, to be completed in the next three years.
Though not in any sense a rival to Sydney's Opera House, with its billowing marble- tiled sails, internally it will offer as much both in the numbers of seats and the quality of appointments.
The Hong Kong Government, which has contributed three quarters of the cost and the Urban Council, responsible for the other quarter and its management, are justifiably proud of the result. Indeed, both the Urban and Regional Councils have co-operated with the government in providing a profusion of cultural venues in many parts of the territory.
This postwar enthusiasm for the arts began with the building of the City Hall in 1962 on Hong Kong Island's Central waterfront, with a 1 400-seat concert hall and 450-seat theatre. Today this venue is the most intensively used facility that Hong Kong possesses, having played host to the world's greatest orchestras and musicians.