Pearl Lam
Daughter of the late Hong Kong tycoon Lim Por-yen, curator and gallery owner Pearl Lam has become a notable name in the art world. She tells Leanne Mirandilla about choosing an alternative career over her family business, her passion for Chinese art and her hopes for her new gallery.
I was always interested in art. I don’t understand, because my parents didn’t have that vibe. None of these Hong Kong families are interested in art! At the beginning, my family thought I was ridiculous. “Art as a career? Are you joking? We don’t want a shopkeeper. Over 10 years in England and you come back to be a shopkeeper?”
They didn’t understand art because, in their eyes, in their minds, art is a hobby. You don’t make it into a career. They wanted me to [go into] property development. Or become a lawyer or a chartered accountant. Come on, can you see anything of me [in] that?
I wanted to study architecture and art at university, but my parents banned me. To please my parents, my first degree was in accounting and financial management. Then I did a conversion course into law and a master’s in law. I gave them what they wanted, as long as I could stay in England. Even now, I love London.
After university, I was sent to do property development [by my family]. Can you imagine? I knew nothing about property development. But it lasted for quite a few years. It was really difficult because, when I was in Shanghai, it was really the beginning [of the real estate industry there]. My friends said I was building a spaceship in a jungle.
We were doing pop-up shows [in Hong Kong] in the 90s—from ‘93 to ’98—that’s how I started. That’s why when people say “I do pop-up exhibitions” and they think they’re cool—my god, I did it 20 years ago!
In 2003, I pulled out from my family [business]. At the time, there was the French year in China, and the China year in France. China brought all these Chinese cultural events to France and France brought all these cultural events to China. It was just huge. I was asked by the French cultural attaché to think of some exhibitions.
I decided to set up an office to do exhibitions. One of them was called “La France Mandarin”—the French influence in Chinese art. All of this was non-profit, non-commercial.