“Art Tech” is the new buzzword in Hong Kong’s creative industry circles. The conversation around the potential of technology to unlock new depths and meaning in art gained momentum after Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Yuet-ngor allocated a generous HK$100 million ($12.9 million) toward Art Tech development in her Policy Address last November.
As anyone following the cultural scene in Hong Kong will know, tech-driven and/or tech-heavy art exhibitions and live performances aren’t exactly new in Hong Kong. A number of artists, producers, cultural and academic institutes in the city have been actively exploring the interface of art and technology for many years. The city’s annual Microwave International New Media Festival has served as a happy breeding ground of cutting-edge new video installations and immersive experiences created as a result of the cross-pollination of art and technology for 25 years already.
Among the several Hong Kong artists who have embraced technology as part of their creative practice is Victor Wong, who uses an AI robot to create ink paintings. Chris Cheung and Elaine Ng have created interactive sculptures powered by real-time data analysis. In the Experimental Cantonese Opera Series produced by West Kowloon, a centuries-old traditional art form has been jazzed up with the help of special effects and animated digital projections.
The trend of using cutting-edge technology to enhance the experience of art was already well-entrenched in Hong Kong when COVID-19 struck. The pandemic added one more reason to turn to technology and test out ways of applying it to help widen the outreach of art through digitization of content, web uploads and online streaming.
While the government encouragement and Hong Kong Arts Development Council’s assurance to consider funding Art Tech projects on the basis of merit and “regardless of the content and implementation methods” must be welcome news to the city’s creative community, there are certain concerns as well.
One of these has to do with the old bogey that follows close on the heels of development, such as robots coming to take away people’s livelihoods. Also people with limited means will inevitably end up on the wrong side of the digital divide and miss out on the tech-powered tools that enable consumption of new forms of art. In a highly tech-dependent society, digitally impoverished people might have limited access to art, and, by extension, to vital life experiences as well. There is also the skeptical view that technology-assisted art might lack a soul.
The first two problems are endemic to most modern forms of society and do not pertain to the enjoyment of art alone. The third is a matter of opinion.
There is also a fourth somewhat tricky business of artists insisting that technology should be in the service of art and not the other way round.
I would argue it doesn’t necessarily have to be that way. Technology in itself can make for a meaningful experience, with a little help from art.
Some years ago the Hong Kong theater group Zuni Icosahedron came up with a series in which the technical aspects of theater — lighting, scenography and sound design — were presented separately and on their own, without a narrative to hold them together. The backstage activities that go into the making of a stage production were pitched as worthy of the audiences’ attention for their own sake and not as mechanisms to bind or embellish a story. It was technology for technology’s sake and yet made for a surreally beautiful and deeply moving experience.
Art Tech development probably has a better chance when the hierarchy that now exists between art and technology is done away with and the two are made to grow symbiotically.
The author is a Hong Kong-based journalist.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.