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equipped studio facilities which are not easily available elsewhere. As regards painting, many people have their own studio so they can paint in their own premises. But if we talk about ceramics or print-making, the facilities are of modern types and the working processes are complicated. Technicians are required to standby to help taking care of both the facilities and the working processes. For sculpture, such processes as carving, moulding or metal welding would need even more stringent technical requirements. So for learner artists, they may not have these facilities at home. For the well established artists like Mr. VAN Lau, and the others, they have already had their own sculpture studios, but the budding artists may not have the same facilities. So for the Visual Arts Centre, the facilities are so designed to benefit those artists who do not have these facilities and equipments at home. As to the name of the Visual Arts Centre, as I stated on previous occasions that it should cover a much wider range of art forms. It should cover even architecture. But here in Hong Kong, the term of 'Visual Arts' is interpretated by most people as to include only ceramic, sculpture and painting, contrary to the much wider scope as accepted internationally.
MR. PAO PING-WING (in Cantonese):—I would like to refer to paragraph 6 in the reply. Mention is made of the fact that the artists can book the facilities for consecutive sessions, and in paragraph 4 of your answers it is stated that the exhibition hall has achieved a usage rate of 72% while the ceramic studios achieve a 70% usage. But then for the sculpture and print-making studios, the usage rate are only 17% and 10%. Two are on the high side while two are on the low side. But how many artists in fact are making use of our studios? Is it that only one or two artists have booked the venues consecutively, or many artists are using the same premises?
MR. JASON YUEN KING-YUK (in Cantonese):—Mr. Chairman, I am sorry for not having such detail information at finger tips. So I have to get the information from the department and to direct a written answer to Mr. PAO later.
MR. MA LEE-WO (in Cantonese): Mr. Chairman, for the sculpture and print-making studios, the usage rates are on the low side. With 3 sculpture studios and 4 print-making studios, can we change the use of some of these studios for other purposes, bearing in mind the low usage rate? Secondly, do we have publicity and promotional activities in mind so that artists can know about these activities and therefore make use of them?
MR. JASON YUEN KING-YUK (in Cantonese): Mr. Chairman, some of the vacant sculpture studios and print-making studios are already being flexibly used to hold painting and drawing classes. Regarding promotional activities, both the Museum of Arts and the Visual Arts Centre are conducting a large number of extension courses. For these courses and programmes, participants are encouraged to learn print-making and also sculpture. For exhibitions and publicities, e.g. in last year, we held an exhibition on Italian glass sculpture while 'print-making' was the inaugural exhibition of the Visual Arts Centre.
4. THE HON. MAN SAI-CHEONG asked the following question (in Cantonese):—Can the Council be informed whether the attendance at the Hong Kong Museum of Art is on the low side? Has the introduction of free admission for a certain day of the week or cancellation of admission fee ever been considered to boost up the current number of attendance?
MR. JASON YUEN KING-YUK, CHAIRMAN OF THE MUSEUMS SELECT COMMITTEE, replied as follows (in English):—Mr. Chairman, this question is in two parts and concerns attendance at the Hong Kong Museum of Art.
Since its opening in November 1991, the museum has attracted about a quarter of a million visitors. Although the daily average number of visitors is 469, attendance does vary considerably. At weekends and when there are particularly attractive exhibitions such as the recent Rodin Exhibition, the daily attendance ranges from 600 to 2 000 visitors.
Compared to Council's other museums, particularly the Science and Space Museums, the attendance of the Museums of Art is correctly lower. However, this is not simply because of the existence of admission charges, as all museums charge admission fees in Hong Kong. The fact is a good deal still needs to be done to inculcate greater appreciation of the visual arts in the community and this is exactly one of the points I did raise during the Annual Conventional Debate early this year on the subject of the 'Visual Arts Policy and the Municipal Museums' in which I urged the Central Government to strengthen the visual arts education in schools to provide and establish a matured art community as the continuous supporting audience to the Council's excellent museums. I hope the arts policy review currently being conducted and debated within the community may bear fruit on this aspect later. Apart from this, the arts museum does also, to some extent, face more 'competition' than the History and Science Museums from the other visual art facilities and attractions.
In this regard, nevertheless, the Museum of Art had also done its own job. As it will be worth noting that since the Museum of Art and the Hong Kong Visual Arts Centre opened with more adequate facilities available, the range of educational and extension activities organized by the Museum has dramatically increased. With a view to stimulating community awareness of art appreciation and attracting more museum visitors, the Museum of Art alone had organized 1 024 such events covering lectures, workshops courses, guided tours or group visits, during the last 12 months of operation in its new premises. The activities attracted a total attendance of 28 749 participants as compared of only 46 events attracting an attendance of 3 081 participants when the Museum was located at the old City Hall premises. The number of exhibitions presented has also increased from 6 exhibitions in the old premises to now 15 exhibitions per year. The Docent Programmes and the establishment of the Friends Society are also examples of attempts to achieve wider community participation in support of the activities for the museum.
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