Video Art, Photography and Performance by Artists from Hong Kong

This series of screenings/panel discussions accompanying the SOAS Gallery exhibition ‘In-/Visible Spectrums: Contemporary Video Art from the Sinosphere’ showcases contemporary video artworks by Sinophone artists along with in-depth discussions about their making and significance with the artists and experts in the field of Chinese contemporary art studies. The screened artworks are aesthetically and technically diverse. They also address a range of issues, including institutional critique, patriarchy, resistance to authority, queer identity, social control, climate change and well-being. Panel discussions at the screenings will be followed by extended audience Q&A.

The videos featured in this series of screenings contrast aesthetically in many cases with those included in the exhibition ‘In-/Visible Spectrums.’ While all the videos in the exhibition are lyrical, poetic and conceptually abstract most of those featured in the screenings involve more explicit narratives and/or forms of social engagement.

This talk will be with Siu Wai Hang 蕭偉恒 and Yim Sui Fong 嚴瑞芳 with Professor Paul Gladston

This screening/panel showcases videos by the Hong Kongese artists , Siu Wai Hang and Yim Sui Fong. Both videos involve critical responses to changing sociopolitical and cultural conditions in Hong Kong. Siu now lives and works in the UK while Yim continues to be based in Hong Kong.

Exhibition and screenings/panels produced and financially supported by the University of New South Wales Judith Neilson Chair of Contemporary Art (JNCCA).

The event is being held at the Khalili Lecture Theatre (KLT) at SOAS, University of London. When you arrive at SOAS, you will need to sign in at the front desk, then you will be directed to the KLT.

Paul Gladston

Paul GLADSTON is the inaugural Judith Neilson Chair Professor of Contemporary Art, University of New South Wales, Sydney, a Distinguished Affiliate Fellow of the UK-China Humanities Alliance, Tsinghua University, Beijing and a member of the governing board of the journal Third Text. His book-length publications include Contemporary Chinese Art: A Critical History (Reaktion 2014), awarded ‘best publication’, Awards of Art China (2015), and Contemporary Chinese Art, Aesthetic Modernity and Zhang Peili: Towards a Critical Contemporaneity (Bloomsbury 2019). He is the founding editor of the Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art (Intellect) and the book series Contemporary East Asian Visual Cultures, Societies and Politics (Palgrave) as well as being the editor of numerous collected editions and special journal editions, including Rethinking Displays of Chinese Contemporary Art: Cultural Diversity and Tradition (Palgrave 2024) and Visual Culture Wars at the Borders of Contemporary China: Art, Design, Film, New Media and the Prospects of “Post-West" Contemporaneity (Palgrave 2021). He was the curatorial director of the exhibition ‘Yique’s Way – Mutuality in Extremes’ (Ugly Duck, London 2024), organizer of a scholarly roundtable accompanying the exhibition ‘Strange Wonders: Jizi and Pioneers of Contemporary Ink Art from China’, SOAS Gallery (2024) and an academic advisor to the internationally acclaimed exhibition ‘Art of Change: New Directions from China’ (Hayward Gallery-South Bank Centre, London 2012).

Siu Wai Hang

Siu Wai Hang is an artist working across photography and lens-based media. Born in 1986 in Hong Kong, he completed a Master of Fine Arts in 2013 at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He currently lives and works in the United Kingdom.

Siu’s practice reflects a sustained engagement with the social and historical conditions shaping Hong Kong identity. Using a range of photographic methods, he examines the evolving nature of the medium, bringing into dialogue traditional analogue processes and contemporary digital approaches. History operates as a guiding thread within his work, through which questions of place, memory and belonging are articulated, while his images foreground moments of encounter that reveal the material and conceptual possibilities of photography.

Yim Sui Fong

Yim Sui Fong is an artist working across sound, performance and participatory practices. Born in 1983 in Guangdong province, China, she received a Bachelor of Arts in 2006 and a Master of Fine Arts in 2011 from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where she is currently based as an artist and Assistant Professor.

Yim’s practice explores the interplay of sound, memory and pedagogy through processes of participatory listening, performative archiving and workshop-based engagement. Working with field recordings, fictional instruments and collective encounters, she develops artworks that function as adaptable frameworks for public interaction. Often taking the form of living archives or social prototypes, her projects invite co-creation and response, investigating how minor histories and shared experiences may be activated and reimagined across time and context.

Image: Cage Bridges (2021), video sculpture, 00’42” by Siu Wai Hang

In-/Visible Spectrums: Contemporary Video Art from the Sinosphere is a landmark exhibition of eleven Sinophone artists working across mainland China, Hong Kong and the diaspora. Featuring lyrical and conceptually rich video works, it explores transcultural aesthetics, everyday experience and shifting identities within the fluid, global Sinosphere. The exhibition opens on Thursday 16th April and is on until 20th June 2026 at the SOAS Gallery. Open Tuesday to Saturday 10:30am-5pm and late on Thursdays until 8pm. Free and open to the public, no booking required.

Header image: The Third Sector (2023). Single-channel video, colour, sound, 11’15” by Yim Sui Fong

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Host or Publisher Brunei Gallery, SOAS