(text by artist)

The Hong Kong audience for visual arts mainly remembers me for my Gongbi style architecture painting. Architecture was my first choice when I entered the Hong Kong University in 1989, yet it was never a childhood dream of mine to be an architect. I only had a dream vaguely about art, and I hoped to study design or architecture after I finish secondary school. The adolescent from thirty years ago did not imagine an education and career based on art.  

Shortly after I got accepted into HKU’s department of architecture, I was aware that I did not have what it takes to become an architect. On the contrary, my desire for studying art burgeoned as I was flipping through all the art books at the school library. That was when I was truly introduced to western art. I dropped out before I finished my first year at the architecture programme, and reapplied for the fine art department at Chinese University of Hong Kong that summer.  

I finished the bachelor of fine arts programme in four years, and fixated on the Gongbi portrait painting as my creative focus. Later, I tried to integrate traditional Gongbi painting techniques with contemporary figures, and my works are mostly about the human body and garments.  

I did not hold much regret when I left the department of architecture, as I saw architecture as a field where I can observe and learn. Around 2006, I painted my first attempt in altering modern Hong Kong architecture into clothings on characters. It started as a few paintings in series, and I was not planning to expand this project in a long run. Owing to the support of curators, media reports, and buying clients, this Gongbi architecture series gets to be ongoing after a dozen years, and stands as my most representative creative schema.

It is quite an abstruse story now that I recall it. I gave up on studying architecture in less than a year, and in thirty years time, the architecture series has become my most iconic work

(translated)

現在香港的視藝觀眾，對我的最主要記憶，就是”建築系列”工筆畫。話說我於1989年進入香港大學就是首選建築系，其實成為建築師並不是我的童年夢。我只能說年少時有個空泛的美術夢，完成中學後希望可以升學修讀設計或建築。三十多年前的少年並沒有修讀藝術成為畫家這種想像。

但我進入港大建築系不久，便知道自己沒有足夠成為建築師的條件。相反在大學圖書館翻看各種藝術畫冊，才真正接觸西方現代藝術，產生學習藝術的衝動。我在建築系未完成一年級便自動退學，暑假時再報考中文大學藝術系。

四年後我完成藝術系本科課程，便選定了工筆人物畫為創作重心，後來嘗試各種以傳統工筆技巧，結合當代人物而成的系列，多數跟身體與服飾有關。

我當年離開建築系並沒有甚麼遺憾，對於建築仍視為一門知識，可以不斷觀摩及增進理解。因此大概2006年，嘗試第一組把香港現代建築化為人物服飾的畫作。建築服裝最初只是幾組畫的規模，並沒計劃過要長遠發展。後來因為策展人邀約、媒體的報道、買畫客群的支持，令我這工筆建築系列延續十幾年至今，並且成為我最有代表性的創作圖式。

我這故事回想起來確實玄妙，當年修讀建築不足一年便放棄，三十多年後，建築系列成為我的標誌作品。