Retreat Week

Special Workshop by Kingsley Ng, Academy of Visual Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University 

General Introduction

Over the past few years, a good number of cultural practitioners in Hong Kong have moved to the fields and embarked on farming as a cultural practice. This is in line with recent geopolitics in the city, and also reminds one of the genealogical relationship between “culture”, “cultivation” and “agriculture.” Lai Chi Wo, a 400-year-old village at the border of Hong Kong, is an epitome of an evolving history of nature-man interaction that is reflective of changing cultural situations. Once a site of pristine nature, it grew into a thriving village with 800 inhabitants at its peak time. In the 1970s, it was abandoned when villagers relocated to the city and overseas. A few years ago, regeneration was spearheaded by ecological and cultural practitioners, as a joint venture aiming to restore the place’s historical and biological value. In the process, Lai Chi Wo, as well as a number of villages in the New Territories became a living archive of trans-culturality illustrative of (agri)cultural practices corresponding to context-bound thoughts about inhabitation of land. Such knowledge before rationally registered in logocentric discourses, will be discovered through multi-sensory experiences in this retreat.

Program by Day

Monday
Walking Trail / Check-in at Lai Chi Wo / Hakka Dinner / Night Safari with HKU Staff

Tuesday
Tour of Lai Chi Wo by the local / Farming Experience with Artist Monti / Hakka Lunch / Hakka Dessert Making / Workshops at Mui Tsz Lam / Dinner by Participants / Outdoor Cinema

Wednesday
Ching Chiu Festival at Gut O / Lunch at Gut O / Boat trip to Sai Kung / BBQ in Sai Kung

Thursday
Yim Tin Tsai Visit (catholic Hakka Village) / Reflection Time

Friday
Pak Sha O Visit with Ki Wong (British and American Living in the Hakka Village) / Debrief

Involved Persons

Kingsley Ng
Artist & Head of MA „Arts & Crafts“, Academy of Visual Arts, Hong Kong Baptist University

Monti Lai, Artist

www.laiwaiyi.net

David Tsang, Chairman of the Cultural Development Society of Lai Chi Wo

http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education-community/article/1824699/lai-chi-wo-enclave-sets-pace-revival-hong-kong

Ki Wong, Lecturer HKBU AVA

http://ava.hkbu.edu.hk/people/ms-wong-suk-ki/

Colin Chan, Village Chief of Yim Tin Tsai

yimtintsai.com

http://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/travel-leisure/article/1908076/abandoned-island-sai-kung-comes-back-life-heritage-site-and?page=all&edition=hong-kong