Ellen Pau's 40-Year Arc from Videotage to M+ Façade
Ellen Pau, a pioneering Hong Kong media artist and institution builder, saw her video work 'The Shape of Light' projected on M+'s 65-by-110-meter LED façade in late May 2022. The piece, a co-commission between M+ and Art Basel, featured a performer translating the Heart Sutra into sign language. Pau co-founded Videotage, the city's de facto media art hub, and launched the Microwave International New Media Arts Festival, which ran for 30 years without reliable funding. She argued for video art's legitimacy when Hong Kong's art schools prioritized ink painting. Her work from the 1980s and '90s is both personal and politically charged. Born in 1961 during Hong Kong's economic boom, Pau stayed after the 1997 handover while hundreds of thousands emigrated. The Tiananmen incident and the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984 shaped her generation. Pau's practice merged institution-building with artmaking as a single project.
Key facts
- Ellen Pau's video 'The Shape of Light' was projected on M+'s LED façade in late May 2022.
- The work was a co-commission between M+ and Art Basel.
- Pau co-founded Videotage, a media art collective and archive in Hong Kong.
- She started the Microwave International New Media Arts Festival, which ran for 30 years.
- Pau advocated for video art when Hong Kong art schools taught ink painting as dominant practice.
- She was born in 1961 into a middle-class Hong Kong family during the economic boom.
- The Sino-British Joint Declaration was signed in 1984, setting terms for Hong Kong's 1997 return to China.
- Pau stayed in Hong Kong after the handover while many residents emigrated.
Entities
Artists
- Ellen Pau
- Shu Lea Cheang
- Camille Utterback
- Christa Sommerer
- Laurent Mignonneau
Institutions
Locations
- Hong Kong
- Victoria Harbour
- Canada
- Australia
- UK
- China
- New York