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Exhibition illustrates what life was like for Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong camps

Leung Ho-yin has curated an installation at the Chinese University of Hong Kong from paintings and photographs created by detainees during their time spent in detention centres

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Leung Ho-yin, who has curated the ‘Nàng Tu Do’ exhibition at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Photo: Chinese University of Hong Kong

Published: 3:45pm, 27 Oct 2020Updated: 4:07pm, 27 Oct 2020

It was in 2016 that Leung Ho-yin first heard about the Vietnamese boatpeople who had sought refuge in Hong Kong. Fast forward four years, the 27-year-old is curating an arts exhibition on them.

Titled “Nàng Tự Do”, meaning “Miss Freedom”, the show consists of paintings, photos and other historical documents that trace a hidden corner of Hong Kong’s modern history – life in detention centres accommodating the Vietnamese who had fled to the city in the 1980s and 90s after the Vietnam war.

Leung says it’s the perfect time to revisit that part of history. “It is connected to many contemporary concepts and social situations as there is a lot of fear and uncertainty in the city right now,” he says.

Soon after the Fall of Saigon, on April 30, 1975, Hong Kong felt much sympathy for the fleeing Vietnamese. But the large number of refugees arriving in the city created social problems, prompting the colonial government to set up closed camps in 1982.

Untitled, by Nguyen Goc Phong, is among the artworks on display. Photo: Art in the Camps

At the time, local non-profit group Garden Streams entered the camps to encourage detainees to create artworks that revealed their inner world. This led to more than 400 paintings and 18 magazines being produced, which, along with photos taken in the detention centres, constituted the project Art in the Camps.

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