The Vancouver Art Gallery is pleased to announce the landmark donation of Art Continuum Hong Kong (ACHK), a significant collection comprising 131 artworks by 78 artists.
Representing the largest contribution of Hong Kong art in the Gallery’s history, this remarkable gift brings an unprecedented breadth of voices, practices and perspectives into the permanent collection, and marks a transformative expansion of the Gallery’s Asian art holdings.
The donation reflects a shared intent: to ensure that the art history of Hong Kong is preserved, studied and enjoyed by audiences worldwide. It also underpins the Gallery’s commitment to cultivating major acquisitions that will support the Gallery’s Centre for Global Asias, an initiative that amplifies modern and contemporary Asian art and thought. Furthermore, this major acquisition will help shape the institution’s future Gallery—where visitors will have more space and a bigger building to delve into its expanding collection.
Assembled over three decades, the ACHK collection reflects the extraordinary breadth of Hong Kong’s modern and contemporary art history. Beginning with a passion for photography that chronicled the city’s shifting ideological and natural landscape, the collection grew to encompass painting, sculpture, printmaking, film, installation and lens-based media by artists who have shaped Hong Kong’s cultural identity from the 1950s to today.
“This extraordinary donation of work significantly deepens our representation of Hong Kong’s artistic histories and strengthens our ability to tell the stories of global contemporary art from the vantage point of the Pacific Rim,” says Eva Respini, Interim Co-CEO and Curator at Large at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Sirish Rao, Interim Co-CEO and Director of the Gallery’s Centre for Global Asias, adds “Vancouver is the most Asian city outside of Asia, and speaking of the ‘local’ in Vancouver implies the global. This collection allows us to better understand and contextualize culture, migration and exchange, and tell stories that resonate intimately with both our local and international communities.”
The gift includes significant works by internationally recognized Hong Kong artists including Luis Chan, Irene Chou, Tsang Kin Wah, Wesley Tongson, Sin Wai Kin and Wucius Wong, as well as works by Hong Kong–born, Vancouver–based artists including Howie Tsui and Lam Tung Pang. Among the highlights are Luis Chan’s Fantasy Island with Turreted Towers (1970), an example of his whimsical, fantastical landscapes; Wesley Tongson’s monumental ink-on-paper depictions of nature, which merge splash ink methods with traditional Chinese brushstroke techniques; and sound-based performance works by acclaimed artist and composer Samson Young.
The ACHK collection also includes important contributions to Hong Kong’s video art history, such as Ellen Pau’s Glove (1984), a surreal super 8 film recognized as a foundational work in the region’s media art canon. Pau, a pioneering artist and co-founder of Videotage, played a central role in fostering cultural exchange and advancing experimental media practices in Hong Kong. Videotage became a launch pad for a new generation of artists, including Morgan Wong and Wong Ping, whose works are also represented in the gift. The donation also exemplifies works created during pivotal periods of Hong Kong’s social, political and cultural evolution, alongside pieces by major international artists who lived or visited the region, including Hank Willis Thomas, Ryuji Miyamoto and Greg Girard.
“ACHK maps Hong Kong’s artistic transformations: from the postwar search for a distinct cultural identity and the rise of a New Ink Movement, to the emergence of performance, video and new media art in the 1980s through today”, explains Senior Curator Diana Freundl. “The collection illustrates the city’s experimentation and international exchange—qualities that have shaped Hong Kong’s contribution to global art discourses.”
To commemorate this landmark gift, the Vancouver Art Gallery will present a major exhibition of art from ACHK and the Gallery’s permanent collection in 2027. The exhibition coincides with the thirtieth anniversary of the transfer of Hong Kong sovereignty from the United Kingdom to China. As a marker of time, the Handover provides an opportunity to consider themes in the artwork and exhibition that reveal complex narratives surrounding Hong Kong emigration, cultural assimilation and national sovereignty.
Artists include: Nadim Abbas, Rosamond Brown, King Long Chan, Kwan-Lok Chan, Louise Soloway Chan, Sim Chan, Ting Chan, Yik Long Chan, Jane Chao, Halley Cheng, Un Cheng, Szelit Cheung, Yee Cheung, Caroline Chiu, Yuk-Kuen Choi, Irene Chou, Chun Fai Chow, Hing-wah Chu, James Chung, Argus Tsz Leong Fong, Greg Girard, Chloe Ho, South Siu Nam Ho, Siu-Kee Ho, Chi-fun Ho, Ching Yin Hung, Fai Hung, Stephen King, Wai-bong Koon, Chi Keung Kum, Sheung Chi Kwan, Tung-pang Lam, Yau Sum Lam, Wai Leung Law, Bovey Lee, Mei Kuen Lee, Hon Wai Lee, Warren Chi Wo Leung, Kenny Leung, Lok Hei Leung, Wei Han Li, Xue Lin, Ticko Wai Hang Liu, Sai Keung Lo, Shou-Kwan Lui, Anthony Hin Yeung Mak, Ryuji Miyamoto, Hugh Moss, Sheung Chuen Pak, Ellen Pau, Antoine Rameau, Wilson Shieh, Kwan Yi Shum, Wai Kin Sin, Kam Han Siu, Angela Su, Hiu Yee Tam, Tak-Hei Tam, Kai Yiu Tang, Hank Willis Thomas, Wesley Tongson, Chaiwei Tsai, Kin Wah Tsang, Ducky Tse, Howie Tsui, Pongyu Wai, Richard Winkworth, Fiona Wong, Morgan Wong, Ping Wong, Siu Ling Wong, Stanley Wong, Wucius Wong, Leung Yau, Tong Lung Yueng, Trevor Yeung, Tung Wing Yiu and Samson Young.
