Hong Kong Art: A Bibliographic Guide

This guide to the literature on Hong Kong art is presented in the form of an online searchable database. It is intended to provide the kind of resources for students and researchers that is readily available in the case of English language material concerning Western art, but which has not so far been available for students of its Hong Kong counterpart. The bibliography is arranged chronologically by year of publication. Users may search by year, author and title keyword (eg. artist's name). Alternatively, users may browse the entire database.

This bibliographic guide has been prepared by David Clarke, Associate Professor in the Department of Art History, The University of Hong Kong, with the assistance of HKAA staff (in particular Chan Kuen-on and Silvia Fok). Silvia Fok served as Project Coordinator for the Hong Kong Art Archive during the period in which this extensive update of the database was made, and she has also served as Chinese language editor for this project. Thanks are also warmly extended to several other people who have worked on this project, often volunteering their labour to bring it to completion: Manir Chan, Stephanie Cheng, Grace Chu, Vicky Lee, Shek Mei Ting and Alice Tsui. Grace Cheng and the Hong Kong Arts Centre have kindly allowed a large amount of data from their own research projects and activities to be included in this guide. Research on which this guide is based has been supported by the following grants: Hong Kong Research Grant Council for Research Grant Council Earmarked Grant for Research (project number HKU 7176/OOH); Seed Funding Grant, HKU University Research Committee.

Copyright David Clarke 2004.

Year, Author and Title Keyword Search

Select the year(s) and type as much as you want in the box(es) below and then click on the "submit search" button

Year from to

Author (Type all or part of the author's name, last name first with a comma separating surname from given name, for example: Wong, Wucius)

Title Keyword (Type the word(s)/phrase you want, for example: Art Journal, Installation art, Wucius Wong, etc.)

Any Field (Type the word(s)/phrase you want. Search will be performed on author, keywords, artist, and location)

Browse the Entire Database

If you want to browse or print the entire bibliography database, please click here: Show all bibliography records

Notes for users:

This bibliography contains information derived from a variety of sources and as a consequence references are sometimes incomplete. Due to scarce human resources, entries listed here may contain unverified data. Please refer to the original literature whenever necessary. We would be grateful to be told of any significant errors noted in this guide.

Names of authors and artists are in English (if known), as well as Pinyin Romanization and Chinese characters (in the case of Chinese names). Due to limited resources, however, approximately half of the Chinese language entries are in Chinese only, and sometimes a Chinese name may only be given in Chinese characters or Pinyin romanization, and not in the form of romanization normally used for that name (this applies particularly in the case of names that have been romanized from their Cantonese pronunciation). When the title of an article or a book is also given in Chinese this indicates that the work is written in or translated to Chinese.

In certain cases, location is indicated when the items are available in the Hong Kong Art Archive (HKAA) of the Department of Art History, the University of Hong Kong. The HKAA is open by appointment to people doing research on Hong Kong art.

Artist files held by the HKAA may contain materials not listed here including items whose source or date is unknown, whose text is extremely brief or which only contain illustrations of artworks. Articles whose author cannot be traced are included in the bibliography, and are listed as 'anonymous' (even though they may not have been published as such).

Although this bibliography is concerned primarily with art made in Hong Kong, catalogues or reviews of exhibitions by overseas artists held in Hong Kong are included on occasion for their value in documenting the Hong Kong art scene as a whole.

Translation of titles by the HKAA or notes concerning the content of entries are given within square brackets.

Artists, critics and art professionals who would like their publications to be included in future updates of this bibliography are welcome to email us with details. Please give full information about each publication, including titles, publishers,year of publication, page numbers, etc. For articles or books written in Chinese, we would like to have the pinyin version of the titles as well. Due to very limited human resources, we should be grateful if you could arrange your bibliography to match the format used here.

In addition to this searchable database, users of this site may be interested in the following bibliographic resources:

1.    Wear, Eric and Oscar Ho. The Hong Kong Art History Archive Final Report. November 1995. [This report includes a chronology of Hong Kong art events from 1835 to 1980. One copy of the report is kept in the Hong Kong Art Archive.]

2.      Lai, Kin-keung Edwin, and Lee Sai-chong Jack. "A Chronology of Visual Arts Activities in Hong Kong 1900-1930" ["1900-1930 nian Xianggang shijue yishu huodong nianbiao"]. In Besides: A Journal of Art History & Criticism 1. Hong Kong: The Workshop, 1997, 135-231.

3.      Chan, Yuk Keung, and Harold Mok, eds. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 1999. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2000. [361 pp. Colour illustrations. Text in Chinese by Chan Wan, Chu Kam Lun, Oscar Ho, Kith Tsang, Wucius Wong, Tang Hoi Chiu, Chan Yuk Keung, Siu King Chung and Harold Mok. Bibliography: 58 pp. of writings on Hong Kong art. Record of Hong Kong art events, seminars, awards, art exchange schemes, auctions, art education, and publications.]

4.      Chan, Yuk Keung, and Harold Mok, eds. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2000. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2002. [442 pp. Colour illustrations. Text in Chinese by Chang Tsong Zung, Jenny F. So, Harold Mok, Cheung Wai Yee, Lee Yun Hang, Chan Pui Ho, Yu Shu Tak and John Batten. Record of Hong Kong art events, seminars, awards, art exchange schemes, auctions, art education, and publications.]

5.      Chan, Yuk Keung, and Harold Mok, eds. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2003, 1 & 2. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2004. [With essays, publications & chronicles.]

6.      Harold Mok ed. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2004, 1 & 2. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005. [With essays, publications & chronicles.]

7.      Harold Mok ed. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2005, 1 & 2. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2006. [With essays, publications & chronicles.]

8.      Harold Mok ed. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2006, 1 & 2. Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. [With essays, publications & chronicles.]

9.      Chan, Yuk Keung, and Wan Chui ki, eds. / Tong Kam-tang ed. Hong Kong Visual Arts Yearbook 2007- . Department of Fine Arts, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008- . [With essays, publications & chronicles.]

10. http://u.osu.edu/mclc/bibliographies/visual-arts/ [An on-line bibliographic guide on modern Chinese visual arts presented by the MCLM Resource Centre, maintained by Kirk A. Denton and Jeremy Sieg, in conjunction with the journal, Modern Chinese Literature and Culture.]

11. http://www.stanford.edu/dept/art/china [An on-line bibliography of contemporary Chinese art, including Mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Diaspora created by Britta Erikson.]

12. http://www.arts.usyd.edu.au/departs/arthistory/courses%202002/pdf/MCAA_Bibliography.pdf [An on-line bibliography of modern and contemporary Asian art mostly of works in European languages created by John Clark.]


The Hong Kong Art Archive is honoured to be chosen as one of the HKU Faculty of Arts 90th Anniversary projects.

Last updated: 3 July, 2020.