Arts + Culture
The 44th Annual Hong Kong Arts gets underway on 19 February 2016. Tickets to headline events such as the Milkhailovsky Ballet of St Petersburg are sold out, but they are still available for many other events.
Founded in 1973 to attract tourists during the off season, the Hong Kong Arts Festival has grown in depth and scope over the last 4 plus decades, showcasing local and international performing artists in various genres.
Shakespeare will be performed in English and Chinese. The Royal Shakespeare Company will perform its acclaimed version of King and Country in English.
Macbeth, meanwhile, has been translated into Cantonese by Rurpet Chan. Adapted and directed by Tang Shu-wing, it premiered to critical acclaim in London last summer, and is surely to be a hit with audiences at the festival.
There will be orchestra, choral music, chamber music, folk music, and jazz, various types of dance, Chinese and Western Opera, and multi-dimensional circus arts inspired by a masterpiece painted by Salvadore Dali..
A highlight of this year’s festival will be a performance of The Sleeping Beauty, performed by Russia’s Milkhailovsky Ballet of St Petersburg. It will take place on 17, 18, and 19 March 2016 at the Grand Theatre of the Hong Kong Cultural Centre.
Festival Plus
Most festival events are staged at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre in in Tsim Sha Tsui in Kowloon or Hong Kong City Hall in Central on Hong Kong Island.
A wide variety of complementary events are staged throughout Hong Kong Island, the Kowloon Peninsula, and the New Territories concurrently with the main festival.
Known as Festival Plus, these activities include backstage visits, guided tours, lecture demonstrations, exhibitions, guided tours, master classes, meet-the-artist sessons,symposia, and workshops.