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Eugene reflects on a past week filled with Hong Kong culture and history through the arts.
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I spent an uncharacteristic week taking in series of activities honoring some of Hong Kong's past cultural moments. It began with a rare visit to the movie theatre to watch Anita, a biopic about legendary Hong Kong entertainer, Anita Mui who unfortunately succumbed to cervical cancer at the age of 41. The story explored Mui's past from childhood entertainer, to Asia-wide superstar and her fiery persona (albeit not entirely captured on screen) and her passion towards giving back to the community.
Being as musically illiterate as I was, I had little to no recollection of Mui's impact but it spoke to the trail she blazed out of a small island of a few million and created a legacy for herself.
I followed this up with a trip to the Hong Kong Heritage Museum in Shatin. I strolled in unaware of the exhibits beyond the return of a highly-talked about Bruce Lee exhibition. Housed within one floor of the expansive museum was a hall dedicated to Hong Kong pop culture. The exhibition featured a wide array of music, design, and film relics that encompassed the last nine decades and more of Hong Kong history.
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In Hong Kong, our greatest enemy is time and then the landlord. Rain or shine, you need to pay rent and in doing so, it puts you on the clock to produce. Bruce Lee, Wong Kar Wai and Anita Mui are arguably some of the most familiar Hong Kong exports. But the clearest reminder was that creativity and creativity with global relevance is not something that always requires much in the form of physical resources and space. It's a welcome addition but the mindset and desire to create and entertain is a perspective and mindset.
Nobody knows if this golden era will ever return but looking back, the past made so much with so little.
- Eugene
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The Bulletin
Hear and read the latest from MAEKAN and the community. |
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| For Your A-10-tion |
The best links from across the Internet.
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1. 👕 Things Could Be Looking Up For Fashion Interns
Highsnobiety looks at the potentially changing reality for interns working in the fashion industry. From legal breakthroughs to changes in workplace cultures, big changes include hiring commitments by large fashion houses, including LVMH, which said it will recruit 25,000 people under the age of 30 by 2023.
2. 💵 When Social Capital Becomes Economic Capital
A look at how the rise of the social token and similar financial instruments has made investors of more and more people. One example is Alex Masmej, who created a token centered around himself that would allow investors in him, the individual, to get a portion of his income but also exchange $ALEX for privileges including intros to his network. A lot of these opportunities give us some sort of future/previous Black Mirror vibe but in keeping with the Web3 positivity, most seem to primarily focus on the upside.
"But moves by Masmej and others like him point to a shift. More and more of the world is becoming financialized, allowing people to invest not just in companies or government bonds but also in art, collectibles, and celebrities. Parallel shifts in culture and technology are forging a new paradigm. The rules around how we create and capture economic value are being rewritten, opening up new roads to the kind of wealth creation previously limited to a select few."
3. 🗝️ The Great Realignment And The End Of Gatekeepers
As a follow up to this same article that he wrote, Rex Woodbury writes about how this latest series of technologies has upended the traditional order that placed gatekeepers on top:
"We’re experiencing The Great Realignment, a systemic restructuring of how economics flow. That said, every era of the web has promised to remove gatekeepers—and yet, each era orbits around nuclei of centralized power. Web2 gave us user-generated content, but profits flowed to Facebook, to Google, to Twitter, to Snap. Will Web3 deliver on its promise, or will a handful of centralized companies devour most of the value? It’s too soon to tell. Some level of centralization may make sense, but likely to a smaller degree than in eras past. "
4. 🖊️ Poet Lee Bains' “Work Lunch”
The eponymous frontman for rock band Lee Bains III & The Glory Fires and native Alabaman takes readers (and also listeners for those who want to listen to the recording) through a series of food-themed poems that explore the American work lunch through the lens of Southern cuisine and heritage. An excerpt from Bains' "Barbecue Spots":
"We are a triumvirate of shit-headed cracker boys. Too much education too little work too much time too little cash. Stranded on the great shipwreck of Atlanta, lost, unknown, alone, hunting for each other. Today we are hunting for barbecue."
5. 😞 Simone Veil Talks About "Pictures for Sad Children" Fiasco
The webcomic artist opens up about suddenly disappearing following an otherwise initially successful Kickstarter campaign for "Pictures for Sad Children," a series that helped to validate sadness in an online space.
6. 🐢 Coastal Species Are Thriving On The Great Pacific Garbage Patch?
Scientists have discovered a series of over 40 coastal plant and animal species that are not just surviving but flourishing in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. In particular, the resulting "island" habitat brings together a mix of open-ocean and coastal species.
7. 🚙 The Car Silhouettes That Have Died Out
As time passes and market segments change, some car body styles have since gone off-trend to be left to the history books. Treating these automobile silhouettes as "species," Autocar lays out the specimens that are under threat (such as roadsters and coupes) and those that have already gone extinct, such as the two-door saloon.
8. ⌨️ The New York Times Guide To The Best Keyboards
We're sure everyone's got differing opinions on the GOAT, but for those looking for something new, the NTY offers its comprehensive look at how to shop for a mechanical keyboard and a list of top picks for different budgets and needs including for Mac and for those who want tenkeyless keyboards (keyboards without numberpads).
9. 🎾 Vintage Venus And Serena Williams Photos Shows Their Early Careers
With the upcoming release of King Richard, depicting the life of the Williams' sister's father, coach and mentor, 14 photos from photographer Rod Lyons have made their way into the Serena and Venus series at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC). The photos depict a close sibling relationship between the sisters that mirrored their love for tennis.
10. 🛹 Skateboarders and Their Sisyphusean Struggle For Greatness
A philisophical exploration of the meaning and value of an activity, drawing from the classic example of Sisyphus and the modern example of the skateboarder.
"Meaningless activities are often labelled as Sisyphean. Is skateboarding a Sisyphean activity? It may appear to be so at first glance. Consider again the skater who keeps trying a manoeuvre, enjoying only limited success (at best). Now imagine that same person who first tries that trick at the age of 15 still trying to successfully execute it at the age of 50. Surely this seems meaningless to our hypothetical nonskateboarding spectator. But the observer’s impression is mistaken."
Anne Berry's Behind Glass series
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