Postcard from Hong Kong Art Week

EVENTS | HAPPENINGS | WORLD OF CABANA

As Hong Kong’s art world reclaims its momentum, The Peninsula Hotel emerges as a stage and catalyst for one of the industry's most diverse contemporary Art Weeks. Its Art in Resonance programme, which coincides with Art Basel, was presented with the V&A Museum this year, lending it unique institutional weight. Camilla Frances explores Hong Kong, and discovers how one of the world's leading hotels is championing culture and supporting artistic discourse.

BY CAMILLA FRANCES | HAPPENINGS | 15 APRIL 2026

Guests at The Peninsula during the launch of Art in Resonance 2026

“Hong Kong is back,” declared one art world insider at the launch of The Peninsula Hotel’s 2026 Art in Resonance programme, an immersive arts initiative presented in partnership with the V&A Museum and on show at the hotel through 5 May.

Artists, designers, dealers and collectors, speaking to Cabana during The Peninsula’s annual cocktail party – now recognised as the official start to Hong Kong Art Week – said it felt like the city was finally enjoying its most vibrant, exciting and well-attended Art Week since the global pandemic. More than 600 guests representing some of the world’s leading museums, galleries, auction houses, and cultural organisations crowded the landmark hotel for the launch of Art in Resonance 2026, hosted by Benjamin Vuchot, Chief Executive Officer of The Hong Kong & Shanghai Hotels Limited, which owns The Peninsula Hong Kong.

Discreetly placed among the chattering guests, musicians and circulating waiters were three newly commissioned artworks by Hong Kong artist Angel Hui, Tokyo‑based Indonesian ceramicist, Albert Yonathan Setyawan, and Hong Kong architect‑artist and prominent collector, William Lim. The trio’s works are the foundation of this year's Art in Resonance Programme, which honors craftsmanship through a contemporary lens and cultural dialogue.

Ceramicist Albert Yonathan Setyawan with Metamorphic Modulation, commissioned for Art in Resonance 2026, in partnership with the V&A © The Peninsula.

This objective was particularly prescient given the art world's renewed interest in, and emphasis on, craftsmanship. All three works included artisanal skill, from Hui's intricately woven fish within a plastic bag (characteristic of Hong Kong's nearby goldfish market) to Setyawan's large-scale ceramic installation (pictured above) and Lim's vibrant painting, Walking on a Bright Future, carefully woven into a wall tapestry (artfully displayed outside The Peninsula's Verandah Café) by skilled artisans from Tai Ping Carpets. 

The involvement of the Victoria & Albert Museum lent cultural gravitas to the 2026 programme with the revered institution partnering with Hong Kong’s most historic hotel to commission a new work by a contemporary Asian artist. Under the ornate ceiling of The Peninsula’s grand lobby, guests admired and examined Metamorphic Modulation, a large-scale installation by Setyawan, curated by Dr. Louis Copplestone from the V&A's Asia department. Art in Resonance underscores the museum's global mission to champion creativity, advance cultural understanding, and ignite inspiration among communities globally, Copplestone said.

“Providing support to mid-career artists by giving them a platform to present significant new works is an exciting opportunity for artistic growth. At the core of our partnership lies a shared commitment to thoughtful interpretation and global engagement, weaving together narratives that transcend boundaries and cultures,” he added.

The Indonesian artist’s ceramic works, created using a slip-cast method, focus on repetition and pattern making, displayed in wall and floor-based arrangements of varying scale and form. In a purpose-built structure that cocooned viewers in a reflective shell, Setyawan presented 700 individual pieces, all hand-modelled in clay, slip-cast in red terracotta, and left unglazed to celebrate the materiality of clay.

The artwork centers on two forms, one evoking a leaf and the other a flower. Setyawan, who lives and works in Tokyo, creates his works by using original objects, which are replicated – often more than 1000 times – using a mould. This labor intensive, meticulous process, which he describes as ‘art labor’ is crucial to his practice and philosophy. For Setyawan, this repetitive practice is meditative and deliberately laborious, emphasising the physicality of handmade objects and the effort taken to craft them properly.

Earlier that day, during a morning panel talk at Felix, The Peninsula’s spectacular 28th floor restaurant, the craftsman elaborated on this philosophy. He also told the audience, made up of global press, that it was unusual to be an artist working with terracotta in his native Indonesia. "Ceramics have an unpopular image in Indonesia because terracotta is very common; people have a hard time seeing terracotta as art. But I never really liked painting, I was always looking for something more physical," Setyawan said.

"Ceramics opened my mind to thinking about art and labor. To me, the 'concept' of a work and the process are two sides of the same coin, you can't separate them. The labour and discipline of art is my life. My ceramic work is laborious and time consuming, but that effort and exertion is important for me. For me, in art, there has to be labor."

Listening to Setyawan was "incredible", Copplestone said, reminding guests of the parallels with the great craft champion, William Morris. "As Albert speaks, I'm hearing the ghost of the craft radical William Morris whose spirit underpins the V&A's mission," he said. "William Morris said that art is the expression of man's pleasure in labor."

The launch of Art in Resonance was followed by a dinner with The Art Newspaper & L’Officiel Art on the rooftop of The Peninsula in Kowloon. Across the water, on Hong Kong island, Art Basel took over the city’s waterfront convention center, bringing with it major art dealers and galleries, including Gagosian, Hauser & Wirth, Axel Vervoordt and Victoria Miro.

Art Basel highlights for Cabana included new works by Grayson Perry, shown by Victoria Miro gallery: a hand-painted cabinet, large-scale tapestry and whimsical series of pots, which, like much of Perry's work, presented themselves as witty ceramic pieces of modern satire. Also of note was a stunning lidded basket woven by seventh-generation Maine-based basket weaver Jeremy Frey – whose contemporary twist on indigenous weaving techniques is generating excitement among galleries and collectors – Alice Neel's glorious portrait Lang Howard (1966) and a 1930s work by Milton Avery, both presented by Xavier Hufkens gallery, and Jude Rae's beautiful still life studies on linen, presented by Sydney's The Commercial Gallery. 

From hotels to museums, the city’s cultural leaders welcomed the world’s artists, collectors and press with pride and panache. The Peninsula even curated an art-focused media programme for global editors to discover Hong Kong’s Art Week comprising fairs, events and major exhibitions. Alongside Basel, the city hosted numerous satellite art fairs, most prominently Art Central, now in its eleventh year, and high profile solo shows, like South Korean artist Lee Bul’s spectacular retrospective (curated by Sunny Cheung) at M+, Hong Kong's largest and most important contemporary art museum.

Cheung led editors through Bul's futuristic show, Lee Bul: From 1998 to Now, highlighting prominent works, such as Cyborg (1997) and Anagram (1999), which featured in her mid-career show at London's Hayward Gallery in 2018. Born in Seoul in 1964, Bul is the most famous artist in South Korea, much-admired for her radical works and courageous artistic activism.

The show is one of two current M+ curations by Cheung, who has previously worked at London's Barbican and the V&A. The curator also introduced editors to Making it Matters, a show dedicated to the art of making, from concept and research to design and fabrication, which explores the role and relevance of human-conceived objects. 

On the ground floor of M+, the best was yet to come. Seeing Sound, Hearing Time honored the work of the influential composer, producer, and artist, Ryuichi Sakamoto (1952–2023), celebrated for his film scores and experimental vision. Sakamoto's 2017 album async – a deeply personal project that inspired async–immersion (2023), created with Shiro Takatani – was the foundation of an immersive installation that transformed his music into a spatial experience that was both visually stunning and deeply moving. 

The Peninsula Hotel, Hong Kong, featuring artworks by Angel Hui.