Street artists’ work showcased on minibuses in Hong Kong project backed by eco-friendly paint company
- Fun project put artworks on the sides of public minibuses to add some colour to the streets
- Six Hong Kong artists took part, and their art will be seen on the vehicles’ bodies until the end of the year
One night in May, a team in Mong Kok worked briskly in the heat to give six Hong Kong minibuses a makeover. They had to move quickly. The drivers were waiting impatiently to get back onto the road.
Unusually, the vinyl wraps being applied were not advertising, but artworks by local street artists that have turned the familiar 16-seaters into roving street art exhibitions.
It was Joakim Cimmerbeck who came up with the idea. The founder of eicó, an eco-friendly paint company in Hong Kong, just wanted to do something “fun”, he says. While the project was funded from the company’s marketing budget, the artists involved were told they didn’t have to include the company’s logo or mention it in their works.
A quintessentially capitalist society like Hong Kong often fails to appreciate the worth of art that is not valued in terms of money or commerce, he says.
“We are a money city. So if something costs 100 million dollars, [it is considered better] than something that costs a lot less,” he says. He wants to see more street art around the city, because everyone should have art in their lives.