Art Thou Walking?

Drink, eat and see some good art—all for a good cause. In the past ten years, Hong Kong’s famous artsy night out, ArtWalk, has built a reputation for promoting local galleries and improving local art scene, and raising nearly $5 million for charity through ticket sales. On Wednesday, March 16, the event will enter its second decade, with 65 galleries opening their doors from 5pm to midnight to showcase fine art while serving free snacks and wine for all ticket holders.

This year, 11 new galleries, including Voxfire Gallery, 2P Gallery, Edouard Malingue Gallery, Galerie Huit, Experimenta and Above Second, will join the event. All participating venues (eight of last year’s galleries have dropped out this year for various reasons) are tightly located in Sheung Wan, SoHo, Central, Wan Chai, Causeway Bay and Aberdeen areas, and ArtWalkers can easily plan their routes according to the map they receive. ArtWalk organizer, John Batten, explains the importance and uniqueness of the venues: “The streets and back alleys of old Hong Kong are incredibly historic and you can feel the history in the paving stones and the crazy zig-zag layout of its alleys as you walk around. Many streets do not have vehicular traffic, so it is very pedestrian-friendly.” The time-consuming preparation is four months’ work for Batten, and on the night, he’ll be assisted by 130 volunteers from the art schools of Chinese University and Baptist University.

Apart from gallery exhibitions, ArtWalk Extra—where you’ll find artists performing live or making installations all over town on the night—is also a crucial and interesting part of the festivities. Internationally respected Filipino/Australian performance, installation and visual artist Alwin Reamillo is the visiting artist-in-resident this year. He will be mimicking a balut (a fertilized duck egg and Filipino delicacy) seller by distributing 50 balut art objects (plaster-filled duck eggs with painted imagery on them) to each gallery. After completing most of the galleries around Central, he will head back and retrace the walk to retrieve the eggs.

“I plan to transform the balut vendor persona into a buck-toothed, bunny eared character—maybe in full bunny rabbit costume if possible—and retrieve the eggs as one would in an Easter egg hunt,” he says. In the meantime, local artist Vivian Poon will walk along the ArtWalk map route in SoHo and mount paper butterflies on all kinds of objects to create a whimsical vibe to the area. Everyone is welcome to take home the small paper sculptures they find on the street as a souvenir and read the information printed on it. Other artists such as David Boyce, Ducky Tse Chi-tak, Nadim Abbas and Joao Vasco Paiva will also present their artworks at different spots.

Last year, a total of HK$428,000 was raised at ArtWalk for the Society for Community Organization (SoCo), a local charity formed in 1972 that has been helping the elderly, the homeless, low-income families and mainland immigrants improve their lives. And it will once again be the benefiting organization for this year’s event. Schoeni Art Gallery on Hollywood Road will hold a special exhibition as a display of SoCo's social action and policy work, featuring photographic works by Sham Shui Po children that tell their own stories.

ArtWalk 2011 will take place on Wednesday, March 16 from 5pm to midnight. Tickets are $450 and available at CAIS Gallery, Plum Blossoms Gallery, Picture This, Connoisseur Art Gallery and Schoeni Art Gallery (Hollywood Road branch only). Student tickets are $150, available only at CAIS Gallery. Cash only. Proceeds from ticket sales go to Society for Community Organization, www.soco.org.hk. For more details, visit www.hongkongartwalk.com.