Futura in Hong Kong: from aliens to Andy Warhol, why the work of New York street artist is out of this world

Well-known New York street artist Futura has landed in Hong Kong together with his six-metre tall stainless steel spaceship, which is now installed in the Landmark Atrium inside an upmarket shopping mall along with his “alien friends”.

“My vessel has landed in Hong Kong and my characters are here. They’re the most advanced characters from my universe,” he says. “I spoke to them and they are happy to be here.” The 65-year-old, whose birth name is Leonard Hilton McGurr, is wearing a black jumpsuit, black knitted woollen cap and colourful sneakers and hamming it up – freed at last from two weeks’ mandatory Covid-19 quarantine.

Futura’s fascination with space began with films such as Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes, which made such a strong impression on him as a 13-year-old in 1968 that he adopted the space-age nickname Futura 2000 (later shortened to Futura) when he began doing graffiti on the streets a few years later. The Alien films have been a major inspiration too, which is why his Hong Kong spaceship is surrounded by his own alien creatures.

He drops his boyish demeanour when discussion turns to the heyday of street art: the 1980s, when he was tagging subways in New York with peers such as Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Andy Warhol. Futura is the only one left standing.

“We were all there, in the 1980s, we were coming above ground from the subway school as you will,” he says.

“Keith was educated in art school coming from Pennsylvania with a certain knowledge of art. Jean-Michel may not have been properly educated, but was very smart in terms of his knowledge about art and what he wanted to do in the field of art.”