Art is a potent tool that allows people to inject creativity into an art piece, but more importantly, to heal our hearts. With the COVID-19 epidemic coming to an end in Hong Kong, Lee Ka Lun, Clive, a third-year PhD student who has also been actively involved in community-engaged arts in the city, organised a visual arts exhibition entitled “RESILIENCE: Farewell” in March this year. The exhibition aimed to provide an open platform for the audience to wave goodbye to the feelings associated with COVID-19 through artwork creation. The exhibition, jointly supported by the Common Core Office, the F:A:C:E: Subsidy of CEDARS and the Equal Opportunity Unit, attracted over 800 audience, including staff and students at HKU, as well as the general public.

Clive was responsible for leading the audience to contribute to the co-creation of art pieces.

Speaking about the inspiration for Clive to organise the “RESILIENCE: Farewell” visual arts exhibition, he shared the story of meeting an international student at an event that he had organised to celebrate World Mental Health Day on campus last year. “During the event, the student told me that he couldn’t return to his homeland to see one of his family members for the last time due to travel restrictions under the COVID-19 pandemic. There hadn’t been any medium for him to express his frustration and upset regarding the loss. I was deeply motivated, and therefore, organised this exhibition,” he recalled.

The exhibition encompasses a variety of pieces, including the documentation of projects Clive previously facilitated during the pandemic with different walks of life, such as ethnic minorities and students with autism spectrum disorder, and the artwork created by the audience, showcasing the value of “Ichigo Ichie”, a Japanese term that literally means “one time, one meeting”. Through artwork displays and creation, Clive intended to underscore the significance of cherishing every moment in life to the audience. Furthermore, he hoped the audience could understand the intriguing relationship between art and healing. “The essence of art is to allow people to express self-healing. This is also the purpose for me to leverage relational aesthetics in encouraging the audience to appreciate the beauty of healing,” he highlighted.

Clive believed that engaging in interactive artwork is a medium for the audience to frankly express their emotions.

Notwithstanding the success of the visual arts exhibition, Clive faced several obstacles during the preparation stage, particularly in designing the exhibition to fit into the HKU environment and to attract the audience. “It’s never a piece of cake for me to design an immersive visual arts exhibition at HKU, given that students and staff here often have a fast-paced lifestyle,” he sighed. To address these concerns, Clive collaborated with various student groups at HKU to discover the perspectives of HKU students, which inspired him to plan the exhibition. Moreover, he attempted to utilise different video projections and set up Instagrammable spots as a means to appeal to students and staff.

Video projections were set up in the exhibition to provide a captivating visiting experience for the audience.