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The Leisure and Cultural Services Department will present a wide range of activities including festive lantern carnivals, lantern displays and the new programme "Youth Night" to celebrate the coming Mid-Autumn Festival. Admission to all activities is free.
Featuring a variety of entertainment, three lantern carnivals will be held at Sha Tsui Road Playground, Tsuen Wan on September 7, at Victoria Park on September 8, and at Tai Po Waterfront Park on September 9. The lantern displays will continue until mid-September.
The highlight of the carnivals will be spectacular folk songs, dances and acrobatic shows by the Beijing Arts Troupe from the Mainland, supported by the Office of Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Affairs of the Ministry of Culture. There will also be demonstrations of traditional Beijing folk crafts, such as Beijing lantern crafting and Beijing zhayan kite (swallow style) crafting by lantern craftmasters.
Supported by the Department of Culture of Guangdong Province, folk art including images of peasant life based on paintings from Longmen in China and Foshan lanterns will also be featured, while local craftsman Leung Chi-shing will demonstrate traditional lantern making by framing paper lanterns with bamboo strips and wires, paper pasting and decoration skills.
The carnival sites will each be decorated with beautiful hanging lanterns, while the Victoria Park carnival will showcase several spectacular lantern displays, including one by the Hong Kong Heritage Museum and two lantern sets from Taiwan.
The Hong Kong Heritage Museum has invited a local master to construct a Chinese-style lantern measuring 7.5 metres high comprising five levels. With the assistance of mechanical devices, the hand-crafted lantern incorporates a revolving effect. The different levels will be decorated by lanterns of different periods, and the lantern body will feature the "hanging works" style, displaying three-dimensional scenes of people living in the imperial palace of the Qing Dynasty.
Two lantern sets titled "Dinosaur Pals" and "Hello Taiwan", which were displayed at the Taiwan Lantern Festival 2014 earlier this year, will also be showcased. With fabulous design and superb craftsmanship, the "Dinosaur Pals" lantern collection displays a lively reproduction of giant prehistoric creatures, while the seven sets of lanterns in "Hello Taiwan" are based on different aspects of Taiwanese folklore.
At Sha Tsui Road Playground, spectacular red and glittering lanterns will decorate the carnival, while at Tai Po Waterfront Park, lantern installations based on 12 zodiac constellations will delight visitors.
Details of the carnivals are as follows:
1. New Territories West Mid-Autumn Lantern Carnival
September 7 (Sunday), 7.30pm to 10.30pm
Sha Tsui Road Playground
Programme: Spectacular Chinese ethnic dances and
songs, acrobatics, demonstration of
Chinese folk crafts, guqin
performances, golden melodies,
Chinese traditional puppet show,
Chinese traditional stage arts show,
a chess corner, interactive workshops,
a lantern quiz and a wish-making corner
Lantern display period: September 5 to 10
2. Urban Mid-Autumn Lantern Carnival
September 8 (Monday), 8pm to 11pm
Victoria Park
Programme: Spectacular Chinese ethnic dances and
songs, acrobatics, fire dragon
dance parade, demonstration of Chinese
folk crafts, children songs,
folk songs, shuttlecock kicking,
rope skipping and yoyo,
creative market and a lantern quiz
Lantern display period: September 5 to 14
3. New Territories East Mid-Autumn Lantern Carnival
September 9 (Tuesday), 7.30pm to 10.30pm
Tai Po Waterfront Park
Programme: Spectacular Chinese ethnic dances and
songs, acrobatics, demonstration of
Chinese folk craft, Chinese and
Western music, modern dance,
Chinese traditional shadow play
puppet show, pantomime, storytelling,
a workshop on light-painting
photography, a lantern quiz and
a wish-making corner.
Lantern display period: September 5 to 14
The new programme "Youth Night" will be held at the above venues one night before each carnival from 7.30pm to 9.30pm, showcasing the energy and creativity of young people with a variety of programmes.
Taiwanese lantern craftmasters Lee Kuan-I, Lin Yu-chu and Lee Ching-yun will present a lecture cum demonstration titled "The Creativity and Making of Taiwan Lanterns" (in Mandarin) at 2.30pm on September 5 at the Hong Kong Central Library Lecture Theatre. Admission is free on a first-come, first-served basis.
To share the joy of harmony and reunion with members of the public, a lantern display titled "The World in Colours" is being held at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Piazza from now until October 5. The lantern display's design features different ethnic groups of the world and demonstrates that Hong Kong is a metropolis where East meets West.
People are urged not to litter or burn wax while celebrating the festival.
For more information on the above programmes, please call 2591 1340 or visit the website:
www.lcsd.gov.hk/en/eo/territoryevents/midautumnlantern/2014.html
Ends/Wednesday, September 3, 2014
Issued at HKT 18:30
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