Urban Effervescence: A Commission for The Cullinan Harbour in Hong Kong.
The project came through art consultant Priscilla Kong, working alongside the interior design firm AvroKO and was part of a broader art curation program for the new property. From the start it was a genuinely collaborative process. AvroKO crafted a beautiful space, with swirling stone, warm brass, layered textures; the artwork needed to hold its own within that space without competing. I worked closely with the interior design team through three full iterations of the painting, each one moving closer to something that felt right for the room: tonally, spatially, and in terms of what it asked of the viewer.
Two iterations of the commission in progress in the studio, August 2025
The canvas took up my entire studio. Working at that scale changes the physical relationship to the work. Some gestures demanded full-arm sweeps across the surface. Others were tight and controlled, shaping a curve, drawing a line. Moving across four panels, applying thin layers, obliterating some forms and coaxing others forward, the surface becomes a record of that movement as much as anything else.
I wanted to create a piece that echoed the broader context of Hong Kong, its energy, its density, its verticality.I wanted the painting to move the way the city moves. Soft arcs rise and overlap across the surface, architectural silhouettes dissolving into atmosphere. Deep blacks and earth tones hold the weight underneath. The seams between panels aren't hidden — they become part of the rhythm, like pauses in a sentence, echoing the cadence of the layered brushwork across the whole composition.
Final version of the artwork for Cullinan Harbour.
The result is something I think of as both architectural and poetic. A meditation on urban rhythm, structure, and impermanence. The city's vitality is captured not through literal depiction, but through movement, layering, and abstraction.
I'm grateful to Priscilla Kong and the team at AvroKO for the trust and the collaboration. Projects like this one, where the work is integrated into a much more rich and complex setting, are what I build toward.
Photos: Jeremy Fung and Sun Hung Kai Properties.
“Urban Effervescence” at Cullinan Harbour in Hong Kong.