In 2020-2021, ICS has four colleagues retired, including Dr Chu Kwok Fan, Mr Leung Chiu Kuen, Miss Ho Wai Hing and Ms Yau Yuk Ming. ICS would like to express sincere gratitude for their contributions over the years. Wishing them a happy retirement.

Organized by the Research Programme for Lingnan Culture of the Institute of Chinese Studies at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), the Lingnan Culture International Conference, “Redefining Lingnan Culture and the World: Materiality, Mentality and the Structure of Feeling”, took place on 5–6 March 2021.

 

Organised by the Research Programme for Lingnan Culture of the Institute of Chinese Studies, the Qing Cantonese Literati Research Project aims to reveal Lingnan literati and their mentality about world cultures around the Opium War, across disciplines in Canton studies (such as literature, politics, history, religion, translation, and fine arts). Professor Lai Chi Tim (Associate Director (Executive), Institute of Chinese Studies, CUHK) spoke on the topic “Zheng Guanying's Daoist Faith and his Essential to the Concepts of Health in China and the West” and Professor Xu Xiaodong (Associate Director, Art Museum, CUHK)talked on the topic “As both trader and literati: Pan Zhengwei before and after the Opium War” on 21 January 2021.

The Young Scholars' Forum in Chinese Studies 2021, co-organised by the CCK Asia-Pacific Centre for China Studies and Institute of Chinese Studies, was held on 27–28 May 2021 at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). This year, the forum was conducted in a hybrid mode, in which the discussants and local participants attended in person while participants from other countries were invited to join via Zoom. The new mode had drawn about 135 audiences including CUHK colleagues, students, alumni and the public. The audience asked questions during the Q&A sessions via the chatroom function in Zoom, which facilitates the discussion and interaction between the participants and the audience.

Exhibition Period: From 13 June 2020 to 17 January 2021

The Art Museum of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) presents the exhibition “Celebrating the Year of the Rat” starting from 13 June 2020, demonstrating the rich meanings of rats in Chinese culture.

2020 is the Year of the Rat in traditional Chinese astrology. Belonging to the rodent family, rats are one of the oldest mammals in the world. Most people’s impression of these miniature nibblers are generally negative. Nevertheless, as our close neighbour throughout human history, people also took inspiration from some of their characteristics. For example, the rat’s strong ability to adapt and breed has become an auspicious

symbol of prosperity.

This exhibition features over ten artefacts on rats and its relatives, such as squirrels and bats, from the Art Museum. Dated from as early as the Qing dynasty, this fine selection of exhibits covers a diversity of artworks including high-quality porcelains, inkstones, as well as Lingnan paintings.

Exhibition Period: From 13 June 2020 to 11 April 2021

The history of Chinese ceramics is a long one. Over ten thousand years ago, the ancient Chinese began shaping and firing clay at low temperatures (approximately 600–800°C) to produce a large variety of pottery. Following successive advances, firing at high temperatures (approximately 1250–1350°C) became possible, giving rise to the production of hard, durable and impermeable porcelains.

To present the development and culture of Chinese ceramics in their entirety as far as possible, a fine selection of ceramics dating from various periods in the Art Museum collection is on display at this exhibition. Thanks to the generous support and donations from the community over the years, the museum has been able to build up a comprehensive collection of ceramics, which has been one of our major collecting interests since the museum’s foundation in 1971. Specifically, the Qing imperial wares are primarily gifts from the B. Y. Lam Foundation, the early pottery and Ming and Qing hallmarked porcelains came from the Zande Lou Collection, the late Qing imperial wares were donated by Dr Simon Kwan and Mr Anthony Cheung, and the purple clay and the Shiwan wares came from the Bei Shan Tang Collection. Taoshi Zhai provided Tang-dynasty Changsha wares and our export porcelains are acquisitions bought with funds from the Friends of the Art Museum, CUHK’s Professor and Mrs. Cheng Te-k'un, and Bei Shan Tang. It is our hope that this exhibition will further facilitate teaching through actual objects and will provide our visitors with an understanding of the development of culture and history through ceramics.

Exhibition Period: From 29 January 2021 to 11 April 2021

2021 is the Year of the Ox according to the Chinese zodiac. Being highly respected throughout Chinese history, the ox not only serves as a main source of food and a sacrificial offering, but also as an important beast of burden, pulling carts and ploughing fields. In addition, cow bones could be used in divination and glue-making, while cowhide and cow horns were raw materials in ware production. Altogether, they demonstrate the diverse functions of oxen. Likewise, Chinese characters consisting ox as the radical express a wide range of meanings and form the basis of the language.

In ancient literature and art, it is not uncommon to see works praising, depicting, metaphorising and personifying the animal, which further show its rich humanistic implications. The exhibition will feature 12 ox-related items from the Art Museum’s collections, including paintings, calligraphy and ceramic wares, showcasing the ancient cattle culture while celebrating the festive season.

Exhibition Period: From 29 January 2021 to 16 May 2021

This exhibition, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Art Museum, is a journey of retrospection and reconstruction from the depths of still waters to the breadth of rivers, leading audiences to delve into the flow of thought of Guangdong cultural elites in relation to arts, culture, and history. It also illustrates the unparalleled efforts and enthusiasm of these pioneers in their quest for applying their learned knowledge of statecraft to practical affairs and attaining a place in the nation’s intellectual community.

Featuring around 130 pieces of paintings, calligraphy, and objects by well-known artists during the Ming and Qing dynasties such as Chen Xianzhang, Lin Liang, Zhang Mu and Chen Gongyin, two phases of the exhibition will be held in the spring and autumn of 2021, respectively.

Exhibition Period: From 7 May 2021 to 25 July 2021

Dating back millennia, Chinese painting is astoundingly beautiful and culturally profound. The Art Museum collaborated with the Department of Fine Arts of CUHK and curated the exhibition, “The Bei Shan Tang Legacy: Chinese Painting”, in the autumn of 2019. The exhibition was well-received at the time. In response to requests from the academia and the public, the Art Museum is rerunning the exhibition to showcase the artistic achievements in paintings from the Southern Song to the Qing dynasties with 120 exhibits.

The exhibits are presented in ten sections, namely Landscapes of the Mind, Landscapes from Nature, Landscapes after the Past, Birds-and-Flowers and Miscellaneous Subjects, Daoist and Buddhist Realms, Portraits Beyond Appearances, Fair Ladies, Yangzhou Painting, Guangdong Painting, and Women Painters. The exhibition hopes to offer visitors a road map for sampling the intriguingly complex and enduringly captivating domains of Chinese painting. Strolling through the exhibition galleries, visitors may feel like travelling back in time and discovering different facets of the past.

Twelve sets of ancient rubbings from the collection of the Art Museum are selected for the sixth batch of the "National Catalogue of Precious Ancient Books”. Together with those selected for the fifth batch, 20 items from the Art Museum are listed on the Catalogue.

The “Hong Kong Impressions” coffee drip bag set developed by the Art Museum was listed as “National Top 100” in the Beijing Cultural Creativity Competition 2020 organized by the Beijing Municipal Cultural Creativity Facilitation Centre.

The Art Museum collaborated with Google Arts & Culture in March 2021 to make its exhibitions and highlighted collections available for everyone online. Audiences can explore and learn more about the artworks of the Art Museum anytime, anywhere. Three online exhibitions including “Artistic Confluence in Guangdong: Selected Painting and Calligraphy from Ming to Mid-Qing China (Collection of the Art Museum, CUHK)”, “Time Travel．Hong Kong”, “Celebrating the Year of the Ox” and over 200 highlighted exhibits were launched on the platform. It attracted 6,031 visitors as of April 2021.

         

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Art Museum, a mascot inspired by a seal in the Art Museum collection (which was also an inspiration for the Museum logo’s design) was created. The Art Museum invited the general public to name the mascot during January 2021. 111 names were received. The Chinese name “文保寶” and the English name “Amuse” were selected for the mascot, respectively.

The Art Museum released a booklet and three educational videos to celebrate the year of the Ox. The booklet introduced twelve ox-related artworks, each accompanied by a fun activity. It attracted 10,275 views. Three educational videos, each focuses on one ox art piece and includes an art appreciation session by the curator as well as a challenge extended to colleagues of different teams in the museum. The three videos attracted 1,243 views.

The Art Museum held an online talk series, “Artistic Confluence in Guangdong”, consisting of four talks, dating from February 2021 to May 2021. The first talk was held on 26 February 2021, in which Dr Peggy Pik-ki Ho (Research Associate of Art Museum, CUHK) introduced the curatorial ideas of the exhibition. The second talk by Dr Zhu Wanzhang (Research Fellow of National Museum of China) was on early Guangdong paintings, specifically the works of Yan Zong, Lin Liang and He Hao. The third talk by Dr Liang Jiyong (Expert on Guangdong Studies) introduced the lifestyle of late Ming Guangdong literati. Last but not least, the final talk of the series was on the literary legacy of Guangdong Buddhist monks, by Professor Yim Chi Hung (Professor of Department of Chinese Language and Literature, CUHK). The four online talks attracted 2,915 views in total. In collaboration with San Wui Commercial Society Chan Pak Sha School, the Art Museum published an educational video on 12 April 2021 introducing Chen Xianzhang, a leading Confucian figure of the Ming dynasty. The video attracted 1,171 views.

The "Research Programme for Chinese Archaeology and Art" (RPCAA) of the Art Museum attaches considerable importance to promoting academic exchanges and public interests in ancient culture.

The programme has started a regular lecture series since February 2021, on the last Friday of each month, from 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Lectures are held by the programme's researchers, frontline scholars from local and overseas to share their latest research on archaeology and heritage.

In response to the epidemic situation, the lectures in the first half of the year were conducted online. The four lectures that have been held so far were all well-received. Although there could not be any physical interaction with the audience, the participants were very enthusiastic and raised many questions after the talk. To view the recording of the online lectures, please visit the programme website:

 http://www.artmuseum.cuhk.edu.hk/zh/training/rpcaa/academic/.

The clips are available on other official platforms of the Art Museum, including YouTube, Bilibili, and Facebook.

The exhibition "Jewels of Transcendence: Himalayan and Mongolian Treasures" was curated by Professor Xu Xiaodong, the Associate Director of the Art Museum and the Programme Director of RPCAA. It was held from September 2018 to February 2019 in the Art Museum. Due to the exquisiteness and rareness of the exhibits, it aroused great interest from local and mainland audiences, becoming the IMUSEUM’s most-watched exhibition in Hong Kong at that time.

The tour exhibition started on 20 November 2019 and continued for 17 months. The first round was at Anhui Museum (2019.11.29–2020.2.23), then travelled to the China Port Museum (2020.4.15–2020.7.31) and Changsha Museum (2020.10.23–2021.1.17). Last but not least, Chengdu Jinsha Site Museum was the last stop of the tour (2021.2.1–2021.4.25), and the exhibits have returned to the museum successfully in the early of May 2021.

The online lecture "Jewels of Resplendence: Treasure from the Himalayas" was presented by Professor Xu Xiaodong on 19 March 2021. 258 people on WeChat and nearly 100,000 people on Weibo joined the event.

The lecture was organized in collaboration with the exhibition, “Jewels of Transcendence: Himalayan and Mongolian Treasures”, that was on tour in the Jinsha Museum. The lecture examined the exhibits, artefacts, and drawings. By studying Himalayan jewellery, clothing and its patterns, Professor Xu illustrated the Himalayas' devoutness to their religious beliefs. It is a perfect integration between spirituality and materialism, a seamless combination of the sacred and secular world.

The lecture not only introduced the craftworks of Himalayan jewellery and adornment, but also the origins and meaning of the gemstones used. It reflects that despite being the Roof of the World, this snowy mountain range still managed to interact with neighbouring regions and exchange goods, technology, and personnel.