Abstract

This paper presents an ethnographic study of an artist's community in Hong Kong. I conduct participant observation in a recently set-up space for artists of different ages and various domains – The Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre (JCCAC), located at a vacant industrial building at Shek Kip Mei, which is jointly launched by a local university and two art-related statutory bodies. The study outlines different agendas from its subjects – individual artists, social groups, the government and managing parties, and the larger socio-cultural context of Post-1997 Hong Kong. I further analyze JCCAC as an establishment parallel to an art-as-market discourse and the cry for heritage conservation in the contemporary Hong Kong society, and illustrates how different agendas from actors involved lead into a Market vs. Non-Market dichotomy, and why is it so in the social, economical, and political context.