In solving Hong Kong arts hub woes, we mustn’t miss the big picture

The financial travails of the West Kowloon Cultural District must not obscure the question of Hong Kong’s future as a global hub for creative arts
Much more must be done to nurture the arts ecosystem from the grass roots up and among younger generations

Damien Green

Published: 10:00am, 23 Sep 2023

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When it comes to the West Kowloon Cultural District and its much discussed financial travails, we may be completely missing the point.

The overall creative arts ecosystem in Hong Kong needs serious enablement. While squeezing hard to find the earliest break-even point for the West Kowloon project is no doubt important from a civic perspective, realising Hong Kong’s true potential as a global hub for creative arts is surely the bigger and far more strategic issue.

Thus, any knee-jerk reaction to the financial issues facing the West Kowloon project may risk undermining the value it can bring as a flagship in the city’s creative arts ecosystem.

In Hong Kong’s art world, there are concerning signs of stagnation and decline at the grass-roots level. For example, independent galleries in Sham Shui Po are struggling to survive. Meanwhile, Tai Kwun and PMQ, both restoration projects intended to serve as centres for creativity and art, are good ideas, but they haven’t quite hit the mark.

In the larger scheme of things, the lack of a thriving and expansive creative arts ecosystem for the West Kowloon project to be the heart of does not bode well for its long-term financial future, nor the bigger opportunity it represents.

This raises the question: are we underestimating the true exportable value of Hong Kong’s creative arts by pinning our hopes on a massive infrastructure investment in West Kowloon? Rather, should we be doing much more to nurture the arts ecosystem from the grass roots up? And this should also be considered in the context of the virtually unlimited potential that the city holds, through its sovereign and cultural ties to the vast market on the mainland.

Indeed, we have been seeing an interesting phenomenon with the return of the lifeblood of the city’s tourism sector – mainland visitors. No longer preoccupied with shopping, they now prefer to seek out quintessentially Hong Kong experiences and sites of cultural significance, which they can post to their WeChat Moments. This is instructive and we should take stock.

The remedy to West Kowloon’s problems starts with fostering, fuelling and providing platforms for artistic expression in the city and among younger generations. Proudly harnessing traditional Hong Kong culture, infusing it with modern elements while promoting creative arts entrepreneurialism could be one way forward.

Entrepreneurship is an essential part of a successful business ecosystem because it involves risk-taking, creativity and innovation. Equally, “artrepreneurship” is an essential part of a successful creative arts ecosystem. It’s about a symbiosis between grass-roots creative expression and prestigious art platforms at the big end of the town – not one or the other. Otherwise, the West Kowloon Cultural District won’t be able to achieve its full potential.

Elsewhere in the region, South Korea has been quite deliberate in developing its creative arts sector over the past 20 years, with incredible results.

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In 2021, the country’s cultural content industry had a 2.6 per cent share of the global market, the seventh largest in the world, with US$10.3 billion in exports. In comparison, Hong Kong’s cultural and creative services exports came to US$3.2 billion.

The contributing factors in the remarkable success of South Korea in exporting its creative arts and culture date back to the 1997 Asian financial crisis. According to Shim Song-bum, a South Korean diplomat to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the government leveraged the situation to reform the sector by focusing on “long-term cultural digital infrastructure and … a business environment for … globalisation, rather than resorting to short-term relief measures”.

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South Korea has worked to foster an ecosystem based on its deep belief that its culture and arts will be loved as much by the world as they are at home, with immense success. This should be both a beacon and a template for Hong Kong, following the Covid-19 pandemic and attendant global economic crisis.

Irrespective of the current financial concerns, the West Kowloon Cultural District represents a grand vision for Hong Kong as a globally distinct platform for creative arts and culture. It is an epic project that can help underpin Hong Kong’s future cultural contribution to the world. We can and should be proud of it.

In my opinion, the M+ museum, with its dazzling range of contemporary Chinese art, outshines and is far more relevant to the real world of today, tomorrow and yesterday than an establishment like New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). My personal view may be heresy for some in the global arts establishment and might rankle with many, but the attendance figures also speak for themselves. As a very young institution, M+ drew 2 million visitors in 2022, just a little under MoMA’s 2.2 million.

From a civic perspective, the West Kowloon Cultural District should certainly not be allowed to become a financial black hole. At the same time, we should not let this challenge alone obscure the core issues constraining Hong Kong’s development into a global cultural hotspot, an artistic trendsetter and one of China’s cultural centrepieces. Culture and arts can and should become high-value exports for Hong Kong.

The West Kowloon Cultural District is a tremendous platform which could help realise Hong Kong’s potential as a global hub for culture and arts. However, the arts ecosystem around it is not currently developed enough to enable this. Redirecting some of our attention, resources and public policymaking efforts to this, as opposed to wringing hands over the West Kowloon project’s revenue prospects, would make good sense.

Damien Green is a member of the board of directors of the Hong Kong Financial Services Development Council, founder of StudioKT – a community arts initiative in Kwun Tong – and chairman of Manulife Financial Asia Ltd

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