ARTISTS’ INSTALLATION ON HONG KONG’S TALLEST BUILDING CENSORED BY OFFICIALS
A video installation that was displayed on the facade of Hong Kong’s tallest building has been taken down by officials and exhibition organizers, just days after the artists revealed that there was a political message embedded in the work, according to Amy Qin at the New York Times. In a statement released yesterday, Ellen Pau, chairwoman of the film and media art group at the Hong Kong Arts Development Council, which commissioned the artwork, and Caroline Ha Thuc, curator of the “Fifth Large-Scale Public Media Art Exhibition: Human Vibrations,” said that the artists had shown “disrespect” by not consulting them in advance about changes to the work and that the artwork would be removed from the show. The nine-minute video, created by the artists Sampson Wong and Jason Lam, was to be displayed on the International Commerce Center building every night until June 22. It starts with the words “Our 60-Second Friendship Begins Now” and moves into a series of numerical countdowns and phrases in both Chinese and English.
The work was shown for the first time on the International Commerce Center building on May 17, which coincided with the start of a three-day visit to Hong Kong by Zhang Dejiang, a member of the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s Politburo Standing Committee who oversees Hong Kong and Macau affairs. On May 18, the artists stated that the final countdown in the video—a series of glowing nine-digit numbers—related the number of seconds until July 1, 2047: the date when the agreement guaranteeing Hong Kong’s semiautonomous status for fifty years after its handover to Chinese rule is set to expire.
It remains unclear whether another work will replace the video. Meanwhile, the artists maintain they did not change their piece and have said they will soon release a more comprehensive statement on their work’s removal.
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