Keeping to Chinese traditions, painter Law Hok-ming treats his guests with great politeness and generosity. Towards the end of this interview at 5pm, the 75-year-old insists on buying dinner.
When the offer is declined, he takes another tack: 'Take this! Take this!' stuffing a $500 banknote into my hands.
However, while Law may be conservative (he sulks after I refused to take the money, which causes a loss of face) the same cannot be said about his works.
Titled the 'New Bambooist', this series of oils is his attempt to paint subjects common in Chinese ink - mountain, water, birds and flowers - using Western techniques.
Showing at City Hall between September 30 and October 2, his paintings will be on display alongside works by his son Law Gon-tin and son-in-law Cen Guang-yuan.
Law calls his works New Bambooist because like bamboo, they 'shoot off the ground and grow and grow. It is upright and is always reaching upwards. It also grows from strength to strength'.
He adds: 'It is time to combine Chinese landscapes and flower painting with oil painting, the fusion of which had created a style known as New Bambooist, and I want to use this style to show the best of the two worlds.' Due to Law's approach in using oil to paint subjects and landscapes conventionally reserved for Chinese water colours and inks, his works are likely to raise a few eyebrows among traditionalists who may see his style as neither Chinese nor Western - nor art.
