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Following is a speech (English portion) by the Chief Secretary for Administration, Mr Stephen Lam, delivered at the Opening Ceremony of the Asia Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) Performing Arts Forum held at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre this morning (November 25):
Danny (Co-Artistic Director of Zuni Icosahedron), distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen.
Anna [Wu], thank you for that introduction. And to our friends from overseas and from Hong Kong, good morning, ohayo.
Yours is a trilingual forum, and that is why, even for "Good morning", we need to say it three times in three different languages.
I am really pleased to be invited to officiate at the Asia ICH Performing Arts Forum, and on behalf of the Hong Kong Government, I wish to welcome all our friends from outside of Hong Kong. We've got experts and professors and people who have been immersed in the arts for decades, from the Mainland of China, from Japan, from Seoul, Singapore, India, Bangkok and, I note also, from Berlin and Taipei.
A few weeks ago, I was actually in Berlin, and I visited the Pergamon Museum. I was left breathless at the sight of the gates of Babylon recreated before our eyes in life size. It gave me a real impact. Several thousand years of history, recreated right before our eyes, for generations to see.
And a few years ago, I visited the Palace Museum in Taipei, and all those who visited could see several thousand years of Chinese history and culture presented in a very elegant fashion - truly impressive. But these very impressive exhibits were all items which we could see and touch.
Today at this forum, we move from the tangible to the intangible. And on today's theme, I wish to share with you three messages.
Firstly, Hong Kong is the place for art development. In the 19th century, we started as a city - we were a fishing village. Today we have become an international metropolis in Asia. The people of Hong Kong have always stood by the core values of freedoms, of rule of law, of maintaining our distinct characteristics as a free and open society. Freedom breeds creativity, and that's why these values have served Hong Kong so well. And that is also why the arts stand a very good chance, excellent opportunities, of being developed in Hong Kong.
Our passion, our wish, our ambition is to make Hong Kong into an arts and cultural hub in Asia so that this will complement and strengthen our position as an international metropolis, an international financial, trading, shipping, cultural centre.
We're very fortunate that in the course of Hong Kong's 170 years' development, we have actually attracted and gathered people of all cultures, from different parts of the world, to live and work in Hong Kong. Their values and their historical background, the rich diversity of these cultures, have been synthesised into Hong Kong as a place where East meets West, like today's forum. And you see this all around us: in the cultural performances we host in this venue and others around Hong Kong, in the design of our architecture around the city, and in the art auctions that are hosted in Hong Kong month to month. And indeed Hong Kong is fast becoming the art auction house of Asia. This is the centre for doing this sort of work, in Hong Kong.
That is why it is very apt for this forum on intangible cultural heritage to be hosted in Hong Kong. We have the soil for such cultural heritage to be retained, to be groomed and to flourish. We have every intention in Hong Kong of passing on the cultural heritage, tangible or intangible, to the next generation. And this really brings me to the second message.
The Hong Kong Government is investing our resources, our energy into our cultural future. We want to promote the development of arts and culture in Hong Kong progressively and aggressively.
Now, just across the street, beyond the Star Ferry Terminal, we are developing West Kowloon Cultural District across a site of 40 hectares. Our vision for this place is to broaden the vista of cultural activities and cultural traditions in Hong Kong. In about 10 years' time, we will construct more than 11 venues for hosting all sorts of performances and events. We'll have an opera house; we'll have theatres for London, New York musicals; we'll have a Xiqu Centre for Beijing, Cantonese and other operas. We are also going to have a multi-purpose venue for hosting pop concerts. Aside from the performing arts, we will have what we call M+, a modern arts museum which will have about 60,000 square metres of exhibition space.
We are well on our way of rolling forward our programme. The great park in West Kowloon will be available to the public by 2014. The first performing venue will be available by 2015. We are investing something like $21.6 billion in the hardware in these institutions, but we want to focus on not just the hardware. Software for cultural arts development is terribly important, and that is why we will support local arts groups in promoting this tradition, this cultural diversity, in Hong Kong. Our hope is that West Kowloon can upgrade Hong Kong further in our position as Asia's world city.
Thirdly, in Hong Kong we do place importance on the preservation of intangible cultural heritage, and we have made progress. The governments of Hong Kong, Guangdong and Macau jointly have been able to secure UNESCO's endorsement of the Cantonese opera being listed as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. This is very nice - this is Hong Kong, this is southern China.
Furthermore, within Hong Kong we have various traditions and events on which we have made progress. Now, the Cheung Chau Jiao Festival, the Tai O dragon boat water parade, the Tai Hang fire dragon dance, the herbal tea and the Yu Lan Ghost Festival have all been inscribed into the third national list of intangible cultural heritage. Perhaps while our friends from other parts of the world and other regions are in town, you would be able to see some of these aspects of intangible cultural heritage which we keep very close to our hearts in Hong Kong.
This progress we've made in preserving intangible cultural heritage in Hong Kong is important. It's necessary. We believe that Hong Kong must progress economically, culturally and socially. Your presence here today enables us to do that.
I wish now to say a word specifically about Xiqu, and since this is a trilingual forum, I will switch to the third soundtrack - not Japanese, but Cantonese.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the speech.)
Ends/Friday, November 25, 2011
Issued at HKT 15:52
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