Life Style

A decade ago, Lisa Chiba, an American living in Hong Kong, received a gift from her husband that would change her perspective on art forever: a Chinese ink painting by Lui Shou-kwan.“I was just mesmerised by this piece,” she recalls. “At that point, I was trying to learn – visiting galleries, shows, museums – just figuring out what I liked. But when we brought that painting into our home, I was taken aback by how much more alive it felt inside the space.”That moment sparked a journey into the rich and evolving world of contemporary Chinese ink art, a world where tradition meets innovation in striking ways.Chiba and two other major Hong Kong art collectors shared their love for the genre recently at a talk organised by Alisan Fine Arts. The talk accompanied the Hong Kong gallery’s exhibitio...

Ringo Lam Ling-tung, who died in 2018, was best known for his early films like the trendsetting City on Fire.Here we look at two of Lam’s lesser-seen mid-period works.1. Victim (1999)Victim was an attempt by Lam to inject his crime thrillers with a new dimension: the supernatural.This was not a completely new genre for Lam; his 1983 movie debut Esprit D’amour was a romantic ghost story. But since the success of 1987’s City on Fire, he had concentrated mainly on gritty crime stories.The film, which stars Lau Ching-wan, Tony Leung Ka-fai and Lau’s real-life partner Amy Kwok Oi-ming, still unspools like a standard cops-and-robbers story. But Lam buries some spooky elements in the narrative to make the viewer think there may be aspects of demonic possession at work.“I’d been thinking about mov...

In Hong Kong, where encounters with 20th-century Southeast Asian art are still largely limited to random auction and art-fair appearances, a new exhibition at Villepin gallery offers a rare chance to see a broad mix of works by two major artists from the region: Fernando Zobel and Le Pho.Born in Manila in the Philippines, Zobel was a Harvard-educated artist, museum director, collector and influential figure in both his home country and his adopted home of Spain. He has long been recognised as a key shaper of the post-World War II abstract movement in both countries.Considering his fame, it is perhaps surprising that his part in a group show within Villepin’s hushed three-storey space on Hollywood Road is described as the first time his art has been shown in a Hong Kong gallery.Similarly, w...

A friend once remarked, in the aftermath of her husband’s death: “I wish the people who offered to go on a walk with me would.”Perhaps they failed to come good on those offers because they worried they would not know what to say.They need not have worried. Had they joined her in a walk, they would have both enjoyed the health benefits that flow from being active – and may have found that conversation flowed easily, too.A simple way to get closer to someone, or to a group of people, is to go for a walk – or do another physical activity together.Shared experiences help individuals connect on a symbolic level, one expert says. Photo: ShutterstockOne study found that walking together strengthens social attachment, so people are more likely to cooperate with one another despite differences betw...

A decade ago, while he was researching his book on African-American cooks in the White House, Adrian Miller came across an intriguing title in the University of Denver library’s special-collection catalogue.The book, published in 1939, was called To a President’s Taste: Being the Reminiscences and Recipes of Lee Ping Quan, Ex-President’s Steward on the Presidential Yacht, USS Mayflower, as told to Jim Miller.“[When] I finally got to look at that book, I almost fell out of my chair. It’s a memoir cookbook. It was the most complete telling of a chef’s story that we’ve ever had in presidential history up to that point. The fact that it was by a person of colour, too, was also noteworthy,” Miller said recently.“So it wasn’t really germane to the book I was writing about African-American chefs,...

In the bustling heart of Hong Kong, where titans of industry like CK Hutchison Holdings and Sun Hung Kai Properties are built on family legacies, culinary dynasties also thrive. Among the city’s most cherished institutions are family-run restaurants, and few are as legendary as Seventh Son, an offshoot of Fook Lam Moon – the fabled “tycoons’ canteen” founded by master chef Chui Fook-chuen.Chui’s legacy lives on through his seventh son, Chui Wai-kwan, who spent his life mastering the culinary arts by his father’s side before opening Seventh Son restaurant in 2013.Now in his 70s, Chui Wai-kwan’s own children are adults. His son Daniel previously worked as a doctor, but chose to leave the medical profession and take on the role of Seventh Son’s director to continue the family business. Not ou...

Seol In-ah is a decade-long veteran of the screen who has steadily been raising her profile in the K-drama industry.She returns to screens in Oh My Ghost Clients, a legal comedy-drama with a fantasy twist, playing the office manager of the struggling practice of Jung Kyung-ho’s labour rights lawyer, who begins offering his services to supernatural clients.Born as Bang Ye-rin in Suwon, a satellite city south of Seoul in Gyeonggi province, Seol always wanted to be an actress and was told as a teenager that becoming an idol trainee would help her kick-start her screen career.So, in middle school, she became a K-pop trainee alongside future music luminaries including Heo Young-ji, who would go on to join Kara.After close to four years, Seol left the academy to focus on acting. She enrolled in ...

My niece got married last week and I was in London to attend the wedding. It seems only yesterday that I was propping her up and burping her after she had finished her bottle. Suddenly, she was getting married.Her husband, my nephew-in-law, is a young British man of Indian descent, and a series of traditional Indian rituals took place at the house of the groom’s parents the day before the wedding.The day began with a ritual presided over by a Hindu priest, followed by the Haldi and Mehndi ceremonies, which involve turmeric and henna pastes. There were also lots of delicious treats.I spent a delightful day in that house in the London suburbs, a day saturated with beautiful sights, sounds and smells. For that special occasion, I wore a kurta, a traditional South Asian tunic, and was assured ...

Many people think of mustard first as a plant or a condiment rather than a spice, but it is actually all three – and more.Some of the plants we eat as mustard greens or other types of brassica also yield the mustard seed, which is then made into the condiment (of which there are many variations) or mustard oil, and can even be used to treat certain types of illness.Mustard seeds tend to be classified by colour – such as white, yellow, brown or black. Brown and black seeds are much more pungent than the lighter coloured ones because they contain sinigrin, the compound that is also found in horseradish.Sinigrin is released only when the seeds are crushed, which can be done by chewing or grinding them.Brown and black mustard seeds are much more pungent than the lighter coloured ones because t...

At the inaugural exhibition of the Tzu Chi Environmental Action Centre in Hong Kong’s Tai Wai neighbourhood in 2021, one particular installation stood out: a school of more than 100 suspended sharks made from wood that had been entirely salvaged.It was an effective and subtle way to convey the message from its creator, Lam Che, that trees and sea creatures share space with those who use and discard them with little thought.Lam, who is in his mid-60s, began salvaging fallen trees and construction waste in 2003, repurposing them in his Kwun Tong studio. He predominantly collects fallen camphor trees and old Thai teak that was once popular in colonial home furnishings.As Hong Kong enters its typhoon season, Lam is about to get busy again.Lam stands with his installation of more than 100 shark...