Public art project in Hong Kong’s North Point aims to reconnect the neighbourhood, where tensions between old and new continue to this day
- ‘Via North Point’ aims to improve the daily lives of all residents of North Point, where major redevelopment over the last 20 years has divided parts of the community
- Public spaces have been reimagined in creative ways, while artists have paired with local businesses and a school to design special furniture for their needs
Most public art projects in Hong Kong are commissioned with a basic goal in mind: to decorate and beautify. “Via North Point”, a new area-wide public art project in North Point on Hong Kong Island, is more ambitious than most – it offers a glimpse of how to revamp old neighbourhoods without wholesale gentrification.
What makes this project particularly meaningful is its contrast with the redevelopment that the area saw in 2003 when the North Point Estate – a public housing estate built near the North Point Ferry Pier in 1957 – was demolished.
The “Via North Point” project, coordinated by the Hong Kong Arts Centre, aims to improve the daily lives of all North Point residents and to reconnect the different areas in the neighbourhood with participatory art installations and designs.
Today, a glossy compound made up of the Hyatt Centric Victoria Harbour Hong Kong hotel, the Harbour North shopping centre and Victoria Harbour Residence, a luxury housing complex, stands where the old North Point Estate once stood. Although it has been several years since these buildings were completed, they still stick out.
This divide between the old and new does not only exist visually, but manifests in a prominent way in the daily lives of North Point residents, according to “Via North Point” presenters.