On May 17, Hong Kong artist Sameen Agha was awarded the Grand Prize of Sovereign Asian Art Prize 2024 with her sculpture “A Home is a Terrible Place to Love”, made of crumbling red marble that symbolizes Hong Kong residents’ increasing sense of insecurity. Australian artist Demet was named Vogue Hong Kong Women’s Art Prize winner with her mixed media piece Red Bean Stalk while Michelle Fung of Hong Kong won Public Vote Prize with her painting Paint Palette Emulation.
On Sunday evening at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, Mabel Cheung’s controversial documentary To My Nineteen-Year-Old Self was honored with best film honors while Detective Vs Sleuths won most prizes overall. Actress Michelle Yeoh hosted the event and presented 10-year-old Sahal Zaman with the award for best new performer.
Derek Yee, Chairman of HKFA, also gave an online speech, commending this year’s Yidan Prize laureates and noting their resilience, resistance, stubbornness and intellect in helping reshape education and bring the world one step closer towards a brighter future. The Yidan Prize comprises two awards; one for education research and development respectively – demographer Wolfgang Lutz from War Child Alliance as well as educational psychologist Cheng Yu-hung and educator Michael Li won respective education research and development prizes this year.
The ICAS Book Prize for Global Hong Kong Studies is a new prize that honors outstanding research conducted by early career scholars on any aspect of Hong Kong studies. Funded by the ICAS Foundation and supported by Society for Hong Kong Studies, its winner will receive both a medal and cash award annually; application criteria must include having at least one peer-reviewed article published since 1 January 2023 (applicant must also have received approval to submit to any peer review journal prior to 1 January 2023) prior to June 30 submission deadline for applications (application deadline for submission deadline is June 30).