Media

HKU weekly notice

08 Dec 2017

 

HKU Graduate School to hold Award Presentation Ceremony
A total of 66 research postgraduate students of various disciplines will receive awards on December 13, 2017 (Wednesday) at the Award Presentation Ceremony of The University of Hong Kong (HKU) Graduate School. The recipients are selected based on the quality of their thesis and academic performance.

The award recipients include 6 students for the Li Ka Shing Prize, 10 students for the Awards for Outstanding Research Postgraduate Student, 50 students for the University Postgraduate Fellowships.

In addition, 48 awardees have received other prizes, such as Hong Kong PhD Fellowships, Croucher Foundation Fellowships/Scholarships, Tse Family HKU-Cambridge Hughes Hall Scholarships, Fulbright-RGC Hong Kong Research Scholar Award Programme and the Three Minute Thesis Competition Awards are also invited to attend the ceremony.

Members of the media are cordially invited to cover the ceremony, the details are:

Date:       December 13, 2017 (Wednesday) 
Time:      4:30 p.m.
Venue:    Wang Gungwu Lecture Hall, Graduate House, HKU

Officiating Guests:

• Professor Mee Len Chye, Dean of Graduate School
• Ms Elley Mao, Honorary Director of HKU Foundation
• Professor Paul K.H. Tam, Provost and Deputy Vice-Chancellor
• Professor Dong-Yan Jin, Associate Dean (Internationlisation and Partnership), Graduate School

For programme rundown, please click here.

For information about the awardees and their fields of research, please click here.

For details of the event, please contact Ms Tracy Cheung of Graduate School, HKU (tel: 2548 0486; email: tracy-cheung@hku.hk)

For media enquiries, please contact Ms Melanie Wan (Manager (Media), Communications and Public Affairs Office (tel: 2859 2600 email: melwkwan@hku.hk)

UMAG exhibitions
1. Ifugao Sculpture: Expressions in Philippine Cordillera Art showcasing the powerful simplicity of the rice terraces

Period: Now till February 4, 2018 (Sunday)

The works displayed in the show range from sculptural objects, including ‘bulul’ statues, deities associated with the production of bountiful harvests; ‘hipag’ (or ‘hapag’) figures, war deities used as vehicles through which divine help can be summoned; sculptural boxes used in ceremonies, the ‘punamhan’; and various boxes for the storage of food—sometimes called ‘tangongo’ or ‘tanoh’—along with other functional items such as ‘kinahu’, food bowls, and toys.

Fascinated with the modern abstract style of these carved 19th- and 20th-century sculptures, the exhibition takes an artistic rather than an anthropological approach, highlighting the aesthetics of the displayed artworks rather than signifying them as ethnic markers or religious tools. For instance, both the bulul figures and boxes are deeply connected to cultural rituals, while they present abstract expressions of a group of talented rural artists.

Together, these selected pieces showcase the aesthetic and artistic side of a wide range of Cordillera sculptural art from the 18th through the 20th centuries. The pieces are arranged in line with various centres of artistic gravity—‘archaic’, ‘minimalist’, ‘transition’—although the lines are sometimes blurred, and most of the ‘archaic’ material also shows ‘minimalist’ elements.

One of the essays in the exhibition catalogue draws comparisons with other tribal arts and describes their influence over modern Western artists, such as the Russian Wassily Kandinsky (1866–1944), the Romanian Constantin Brancusi (1876–1957) and the French artist George Braque (1882–1963). This claim is based on visual comparisons and it is each object’s physical structure, design value and international character that is highlighted in the current exhibition.

Venue: 1/F Fung Ping Shan Building, UMAG, HKU, 90 Bonham Road, Pokfulam

2. First display of North Korea’s 20th Century Propaganda Posters in HK

Period: Now till January 28, 2018 (Sunday)

Rice is Socialism!
Stylistically influenced by communist brutalist propaganda and ideologically informed by the core work on North Korean art—Kim Jong Il’s 1992 publication Treatise on Art (Misullon)—all of these state-commissioned posters promote ‘correct’ forms of socialist realism, thereby documenting the socio-political and economic policies communicated from the Leader to the North Korean people. In so doing, daily activities are aligned with political beliefs. For example, the metaphorical configuration of rice farming with the cultivation of socialism.

Beyond their overtly ideological character, the posters also confer messages related to practical agricultural technology, industrial and social developments, while portraying a distinctly human picture of the varied urban and rural communities. Altogether, the imagery displayed offers insights into a country that few have visited and from which first-hand information remains sporadic and inconsistent at best.

Venue: 2/F Fung Ping Shan Building, UMAG, HKU, 90 Bonham Road, Pokfulam

Opening Hours:
09:30 – 18:00 (Monday to Saturday)
13:00 – 18:00 (Sunday)
Closed on University and Public Holidays

Tel/Email: (852) 2241 5500 (General Enquiry) / museum@hku.hk
Admission: Free
Website: www.umag.hku.hk/en/

Media enquiries:
UMAG Programme Assistant Miss Chelsea Choi, Tel: (852) 2241 5509, Email: cchelsea@hku.hk