In late January 2020, Western gallery owners were writing to the organisers of Art Basel Hong Kong and imploring them to pull the plug on the annual international art fair. Those letters seemed to have crystalised the bleak mood that permeated the Hong Kong market at the beginning of last year.

At the time of writing, Hong Kong’s civil society was prospering. Art as a manifestation of the freedom of expression is now secured by the Basic Law. In the aftermath of the AntiExtradition Law Amendment Bill Movement and the beginning of the era of National Security Law, contemporary art exhibitions in Hong Kong in 2020 blossomed. While the pandemic made gatherings difficult, it didn’t deter the enthusiasm of exhibition organisers. In the hard-won time and space, there were artists who continued to take the direct path to record the still-experienced black violence. Some used less direct methods, such as abstractions, fables, landscapes, and rituals, to soothe unhealed wounds and gather up the fragmented selves. If the turbulent year of 2019 represented Hong Kong people’s passionate identification with their country and home, 2020 probably ushered in the further integrated two-systems risen from the ashes. This essay references Gregory Feldman’s analysis of love and sovereignty, and Nicholas Mirzoeff’s study of visuality in social movements, in an observation of the confidence of being one’s own master. There is no further need to listen to the domineering colonisers.

During the lockdowns implemented in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, physical white cube spaces were reproduced in online galleries. Social media was not only used as a promotional tool but also as a place for education, transaction, and interaction. Different players, from brick-and-mortar museums to alternative art spaces, were forced to innovate. In 2020, there were a number of online exhibitions that reconsidered perceptions of art and how it created impact through online initiatives in the context of restrictions on physical exchanges. The present work sketches the emerging phenomenon of artists’ and art institutions’ use of various online strategies in Hong Kong. By presenting examples from several online projects from 2020, this essay seeks to analyse how different technologies have been adopted in the art world and explores the broader implications on art and technology.

In recent years, with a lot of official and semi-official fundings, Hong Kong’s community art events have seen considerable growth. In addition to funding over the years from the Hong Kong Arts Development Council, Hong Kong Jockey Club, Urban Renewal Authority, Leisure and Cultural Services Department, and the District Councils, recently the Environmental Protection Department, Intangible Cultural Heritage Office, and Tourism Commission have also been sponsoring or organising community art events, while many commercial corporations, propelled by the West Kowloon Cultural District effect, have also provided more fundings. With the catchword ‘community’, art events seem ever closer and dearer to the people. Many of the community art initiated from the bottom up, since 1997, due to the drastic changes in the political environment and the increase of social movements have promoted civic awareness in the local communities: After the Umbrella Movement we have the appeal for ‘Umbrella in the Community’, while the spontaneous protest art ‘Lennon Wall’ of 2019 could be found in all the eighteen districts, demonstrating the rise and accumulation of civil power. Can community art in Hong Kong build communities? This research focuses on community art projects commenced after 1997, with the help of literature and interviews with organisers and audiences, and participant observation methodology, to see how community art practitioners formed relationships with the community. Adopting as framework are the five major orientations in community building, namely People, Culture, Place, Landscape, and Production, proposed by Kiyoshi Miyazaki, to examine how community art in Hong Kong built communities; while Yu Kwok-lit Louis’ ‘BEAM theory’ and Joshua Guetzkow’s ‘Mechanisms of Arts Impact’ are applied to the evaluation of the comparatively successful examples of community building. The essay attempts to find out the criteria for art to effectively build communities, analyse the difficulties and challenges, and explore the possibilities of sustainable development.

Since early 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has been spreading all over the world and has tremendous affecting everyday life globally. Its termination is nowhere to be seen yet. Focusing on the two years of 2019 and 2020, the present essay aims at shedding light on the strategies of preserving ICH by rethinking the cases of Cantonese, Chiu Chow and Hok Lo ritual dramas, including both live-performer theater and puppet shows.

Looking back at the last decade of Hong Kong Chinese opera’s artistic-administrative practices from 2020 the year of COVID-19 lockdown, Arthur Pang draws our attention to a sudden closure of a 10-year plus of stable existence of the traditional art form in this city. Chinese opera events in 2019 made Hong Kong feel jubilant for the vibrant performances on stage, the Chinese Opera Festival 2019 colored by the variety of regional Chinese operas presented, the grand opening of the long-awaited world-class Xiqu Centre…. All that predictable, uplifting movements dissolved into a prolonged unstable sequence of stop-motion since the first confirmed COVID-19 case in town in early 2020. Pang in this article first gives a quick overview of the recent history of the program presentations of regional Chinese operas in Hong Kong before contrasting the Chinese opera programs in 2019 and 2020 with respect to social stability and instability; and, viewing from the vantage point of 2020, mapping the strategies of programming regional Chinese operas of the Chinese Opera Festival and the Xiqu Centre.

Strength and energy from the private sector of Chinese opera in Hong Kong has always been a major life force in the transmission and education of this traditonal performing art. From the post-World War II years to the 1970s, there were private Chinese opera schools run by Fen Ju Hua and Yu Jim Yuen in Peking opera; Chan Fei Nong, Yam Kim Fai and Pak Suet Sin in Cantonese opera. These master performers trained many talents keeping the art form alive. In the last decade, there have emerged numerous large and small private Chinese opera schools, troupes, organizations devoting to Chinese opera education especially for young people. Chan Yee Lam selected a handful of the more prominent private schools and overviewed their organization structure, forms of training, activities, and student sources to reflect on their contributions to the transmission of the art in the last 20 years. Attention was paid to the 2020 pandemic’s impact on these private groups’ survival. Chan summarized their technological tackling of the challenges, marking aspects of how the transmission of Chinese opera was still being managed in the time of COVID-19.

2020， Hong Kong Chinese opera’s year of mischance (for that matter， same to all performing arts and other arts fields). Since early 2020， COVID-19 quickly turned a global pandemic causing lockdowns of almost everything. A year back， 2019， Hong Kong Chinese opera enjoyed a blossoming year beginning with the January grand opening of the magnificent West Kowloon Cultural District Xiqu Centre. Stepping into January 2020， the industry was like being thrown into an apocalyptic dystopia of contagion. New productions， large scale shows， ritual drama performances， overseas and non-local troupes’ visits， educational and promotional activities were all drastically shrunk， rescheduled， relocated to virtual space， or simply cancelled. COVID-19 cancelled culture， in a sense， amongst other things in everyday life. The Chinese opera practitioners in Hong Kong have been syncretic， flexible， and enduring in face of the devastating pandemic. Some turned more to social media platforms， some grabbed any chance of face-to-face meeting live audiences whenever circumstances allowed， and some strived for raising fund to help sustain the industry that was virtually thrown into ice age. A mainstream cultural tradition in Chinese opera for 800 years (counting from the maturation of traditional Chinese theatre in the Mongolian dynasty from the 13th century) is that， unlike European drama that has privileged tragedy since the ancient Greeks， there is necessarily， almost always a happy ending. Even when occasionally there emerged a play with a sad ending in which good people suffered and got unjustly killed in tragic sublime， the dejected ending will be altered and replaced by a comic resolution in later adaptations with a full happy reunion. Thus lived Hong Kong Chinese opera.

Every performance takes place in the moment, but the production of a performance is a cumulative process. In addition to the preparations beforehand, the staging of a performance involves the experience of creators, theatre groups, or even the extensive cultural experience of the entire performing arts industry. Apart from memory, this experience can only be preserved by records. Unfortunately, the awareness of documenting performances among Hong Kong theatre workers is not yet widespread, nor is there a comprehensive central system which keeps records of local performances. Nonetheless, it turns out that many local theatre groups already have considerable experience in documenting performances. For this article, the editorial team of Hong Kong Drama Overview 2019 & 2020 invited four seasoned theatre groups, namely Chung Ying Theatre Company, Zuni Icosahedron, On & On Theatre Workshop, and Theatre du Pif, to exchange ideas on archiving strategies, discuss the obstacles and challenges in their implementation, and explore the significance and development of documentation.