HONG KONG-CHINA/UMBRELLA FESTIVAL Art festival celebrates Hong Kong's Umbrella Movement protests

Record ID: 154140

  • Title: HONG KONG-CHINA/UMBRELLA FESTIVAL Art festival celebrates Hong Kong's Umbrella Movement protests
  • Date: 24th May 2015
  • Summary: DANCERS DRESSED AS PROTESTERS HOLDING UP YELLOW UMBRELLAS TO SHIELD THEMSELVES FROM DANCERS DRESSED AS POLICE OFFICERS HOLDING BATONS DANCER DRESSED AS POLICE OFFICER DANCING DANCER DRESSED AS PROTESTER DANCING DANCERS DRESSED AS POLICE OFFICERS PUSHING DANCERS DRESSED AS PROTESTERS TO THE GROUND DANCER DRESSED AS POLICE OFFICER HOLDING UP PEPPER SPRAY PROP AND DANCING DAN
  • Embargoed: 8th June 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: China
  • Country: China
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVAU26UDIIHK30DEVQB63JJ1FPD
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Artists inspired by Hong Kong's 2014 mass pro-democracy protests showcased their work at a student-run art festival on Sunday (May 24).
    The 79-day-long demonstrations began in September 2014, with police throwing tear gas to disperse hundreds of thousands of protesters who blocked main roads to demand a fully democratic election with open nominations.
    The demonstration was named the Umbrella Movement after the items protesters used to shield themselves from pepper spray and batons.
    Almost six months after police dismantled the last protest camps, students at the Chinese University of Hong Kong organised the Umbrella Festival to provide a platform for artists inspired by the movement.
    One of the artworks featured a cardboard cutout of the city's unpopular leader, Leung Chun-ying, lying inside a coffin.
    On Sunday, a performance artist from Singapore, Marla Bendini, lay inside the coffin in a piece of performance art called "Foreign Forces".
    Chinese University lecturer Benny Lim invited visitors to shout their thoughts at the coffin, and suggested they bow three times in the traditional Chinese gesture of paying respects to the dead.
    Lim said he hoped the festival would help visitors reflect on the demonstrations.
    "It's important that six months later, you get a chance to reflect and to really think about what really happened back then and looking from current perspective, from this point in time versus that time, you know," he said.
    The festival also featured a replica of the Lennon Wall, where protesters stuck post-it notes with messages of hope and encouragement during the movement, as well as dance performances.
    Doctor Doris Leung, who took part in the protests, said the festival helped remind her to keep fighting for democracy.
    "For people who participated in the Occupy Central protests, it is a memory, and it also reminds us to continue pursuing our initial aim. No matter how the political situation stands now, we have to persevere and keep striving towards our ultimate goal," she said.
    Another visitor, 29-year-old designer Anson Sit, said that while the movement was officially over, its spirit still lingered.
    "The biggest meaning of this festival is to, as they say, keep sowing the seeds. The Umbrella Movement only lasted for a few months but its symbolic meaning can go beyond those few months," he said.
    Beijing has said it will allow Hong Kong's five million registered voters to elect their chief executive in 2017, but only from pre-screened candidates.
    The government has published an electoral blueprint that adheres to Beijing's vision, and Hong Kong's legislature will vote on the controversial plan in early summer. Pan-democratic lawmakers hold a veto majority in the legislature and have vowed to vote it down.
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