Visual arts exhibition: Wurth Gallery, Goethe Institute at the Arts Centre, Wan Chai. Tel: 2802 0088. Until June 10. Free.
What an image. The baby's head is grasped in the hairy hand of an unknown man, the tiny figure thrust up over his groin. A birth? A deeply erotic, highly disturbing vision? It turns out to be an extremely provocative piece of design work. 'Childhood is not child's play' reads a barely seen strip at the corner of the poster, created for a Child Protection series by designer/adman Michael Cheung. Works like it are the focus of the exhibitition presented by graphic designer Charles Ng, a committee member of the Hong Kong Designer's Association among other things. The collection, Provocative Design, tries to define exactly what that is. It aims to analyse its influences and the power of images.
Ng sees the exhibition-cum-seminar as a platform for taking a look at rethinking the rules. 'Design in Hong Kong has developed significantly over the last 40 years. Yet designers and the public still lack critical awareness.' The problem, Ng says, is that we're more fascinated by visual images as decoration or imitation than by the interpretive element of the concept. In Hong Kong, there's a need to break a tendency towards genteel work. As one designer puts it: 'There is a two-faced approach to sexual matters in Hong Kong which is old-fashioned by both local and overseas standards.'
