Spirit of Hong Kong Awards: artist with multiple illnesses devotes time to charitable causes
- Sophia Hotung has gone from a stressful corporate career to successful artist after her deteriorating health pushed her to make a change
- Creator in final round for Spirit of Culture finalist for this year’s Spirit of Hong Kong Awards thanks to her support of local causes and charities
Hongkonger Sophia Hotung’s journey from a stressful corporate career to a successful artist came about when her deteriorating health forced her to re-evaluate life as she struggled to balance a nine-to-five work schedule with constant hospital visits.
The artist was diagnosed with autoimmune hepatitis, a condition that causes a patient’s immune system to attack their liver, in 2011. The 29-year-old has since developed six other chronic illnesses, leaving her bedridden for most of 2020.
That same year, Hotung received an iPad for Christmas from her mother and decided to spend the time teaching herself to draw using an app called Procreate.
The decision eventually led her to create “The Hong Konger” collection, her own take on the iconic cover art from the popular magazine The New Yorker, over 2021 and 2022.
Hotung said she loved exploring the concept of space in her art and writing, utilising it in her compendium of poems and illustrations The Hong Konger Anthology and The Heist of Hooded Light, a children’s mystery novel created in collaboration with K11 ARTUS’s artist-in-residence programme.
She draws on the concept in The Stowaways Symphony, a new book coming out this November to mark the 50th anniversary of the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra.
The artist also pursues corporate and philanthropic commissions through her company Pangolin Society, founded in 2022, which sets aside 20 per cent of profits from her limited series print sales for her charitable fund.