島與半島
ISLAND__PENINSULA
Glamor, Efficiency, Orderliness and Constant Change:
Making of the Hong Kong Architectural Landscape
HONG KONG
香港
A city resting on a unique landscape form by islands and a peninsula. It does not have many natural resources, but given its unique historical background, as well as economic and politic development, it has become the international city as we know it. Many people who have not visits Hong Kong imagine it as an island, while in fact, it is made up of over 200 islands. The city is spread across the Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon peninsula, and extends all the way to the mainland of the New Territories.
香港，一座座落於獨特地貌之上的城市，由島與半島所組成。這地方缺乏天然資源，卻憑其歷史機遇、經濟和政治發展，演變成今天的國際大都會。時至今日，仍有許多從未到訪的人設想香港是一座島。事實是，這座城市橫跨香港島與九龍半島，再一直延伸到新界內陸， 並由超過兩百個島嶼所組成。
How should Hong Kong’s architectural landscape be portrayed in Los Angeles? Compared to Los Angeles’ flat terrain, Hong Kong’s landscape stands out as hilly and filled with twists and turns. Los Angeles’ dependency on private vehicles stands in stark contrast to Hong Kong’s highly efficient and convenient public transport system. The endless horizontal development of Los Angeles takes an opposite direction to the extreme vertical tendency of Hong Kong’s architecture. Between the two city’s completely different cityscapes, the uniqueness of Hong Kong’s architecture can be clearly articulated.
要將香港建築帶去洛杉磯，該呈現一個怎樣的、關於香港建築的面貌呢？對照洛杉磯的廣闊平坦，香港的地勢更顯其起伏多變；相比洛杉磯對私家車的依賴，香港的公共交通確實便捷而高效率；相對洛杉磯那仿彿永無止境的橫向都市發展，香港的垂直性更顯極端。在兩地截然不同的生活和都市形態下，我們應能更清楚地說明香港建築的獨特之處。
The concept of this exhibition came from “Island and Peninsula”, a novel about Hong Kong city life written by renowned Hong Kong author Liu Yichang in the 1970s. In the book, fragments of stories came together to showcase the nearly mundane daily life of the inhabitants of a city made up of an island and a peninsula. This exhibition takes the imagery of Hong Kong as an island and a peninsula as a point of departure, and assembled many unique “Hong Kong style” architecture stories. In the exhibition venue, continuous landscapes resembled an abstract, conceptual model of island and peninsula. The exhibits take root on the contours of the landscape, and fall within one of the four zones representing the core values of glamor, efficiency, orderliness, and constant change. These 4 core values give rise to the 14 ways of Hong Kong architecture. Apart from the architectural works, artist Keith Lam created a multimedia work depicting the 4 values through data visualization. Writer Wong Yi created an alternative Hong Kong Writing, which provides another imaginative dimension for the exhibits.
是次展覽的理念源起於小說《島與半島》。這部由知名作家劉以鬯於上世紀七十年代所寫成的小說，是一部以城市生活為核心的香港書寫。它由零碎的故事組合而成，展現一座由島與半島所組成的小城上，居民們近乎瑣碎的日常生活。展覽以此為出發點，以島與半島作為香港的意象，承載着獨特的香港建築，組成不同的「香港式」建築故事。在若大的展場內，覆蓋着延綿的地勢，仿如一座島與半島的概念模型、一個抽象的場景。展品們猶如植根於地勢上的聚落，分佈在展場內的四個區域，展示着由四個核心價值魅、效、序、變所衍生的十四個香港建築方法，並形成島與半島這地貌上的四片「板塊」。除建築作品外，亦展出由藝術家林欣傑以四個核心價值為藍本所創作的多媒體作品。作家黃怡亦為展覽寫下了另類的香港書寫，讓建築作品多加一重想像空間。
