It's telling how artists Cheng Yee-man and Clara Cheung Ka-lei marked their engagement in 2004: they donned traditional Chinese wedding outfits and joined the annual July 1 protest rally as a piece of performance art.
Cheng and Cheung, who have since married, are artists of the political stripe and believe art has a definite role to play in helping to raise social awareness among the public. That's why they set up C&G Artpartment, an independent space in Prince Edward, three years ago. The gallery has a clear and strict curatorial policy: it only showcases art with a social or political slant.
Although the genre doesn't have broad appeal, C&G Artpartment has overcome the odds to survive, and even grow. Indeed, their uncompromising stance is partly responsible for the gallery's continued existence, says Cheng, better known in artistic circles as Ah Gum.
'Other artists have asked whether we would rent out our space for them to display their work but we have repeatedly said no because we only show political art,' he says. 'If they want to exhibit their art, there are plenty more spaces elsewhere they can use.'
Lopsided media coverage of the couple's 2004 performance - most focused on their colourful garb rather than the significance of their action in Wedding Engagement at the Demonstration, Cheng says - has fired his creative energies.
The 34-year-old spent the past five years examining how the media interpreted, or misinterpreted, their work, and turned their observations into a series of unorthodox self-portraits, some of which will go on show in his debut solo exhibition, Black White Q&A 2007-2010, at the Fringe Club this week.