Creating connections across cultures
Are you ready to SPARK?
From 20-23 October 2021, the British Council will be hosting a series of free online events across art, music, dance, education, and much more.
Celebrating connections and inclusion in our communities, SPARK will offer a platform for cultural exchange between Hong Kong and the UK.
Showcasing the best of digital culture amongst our creative partners, SPARK will once again open eyes, ears, minds, and – this year particularly – hearts, inspiring creative SPARKs to co-create and collaborate, with inclusion at the core.
Join us at this new online space for creativity, ideas and possibilities. All events are free, but some require registration. Please sign up for our newsletter to keep in touch with the latest programme announcements and registration details.
4 days, 25+ events
Take a first glimpse of our four festival themes:
Cloud Piazza
A range of public events providing a space for knowledge exchange, debate and interactions. Join Rooftop Productions' to.gather virtual residency and Edinburgh Napier University's Radicals art co-creation platform.
Novel Dimensions
Break out from physical limitations with events that enable new virtual experiences. 'Leave Your Body' with Videotage's Minecraft virtual reality (VR) experience and Magpie Dance's virtual dance workshop, led by ambassadors with learning disabilities.
Common Good
Inclusion and accessibility are at SPARK’s core. Learn more about dementia and social issues with Enable Foundation and Hong Kong Design Institute.
Bridging Cities
Bridge geographical gaps for cultural understanding and exchange. Join Wind & Foster and creatives from Hong Kong Baptist University, Central Saint Martins and University of Warwick for immersive twin-cities' experiences.
Our first line-up announcement is out!
We are excited to announce our first line-up of nine fascinating multimedia programmes across the realms of art, design, film, dance, literature, education, and more, all with connections and inclusion at their core. Meet us at Cloud Piazza, the first theme of SPARK 2021, for mind-blowing digital experiences. Rooftop Productions and Sydenham Arts' to.gather showcases an 8-bit virtual residency, where like-minded creatives get to meet one another at the festival.
Edinburgh Napier University collaborates with the Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK) to host a collective art platform Radicals, where participants can input English and Chinese characters to co-create an art piece.
Venture into the festival's second theme of Novel Dimensions, where UK artist Gary Woodley collaborates with Hong Kong's new media org. Videotage to bring Leave Your Body virtual residency to life on video gaming platform Minecraft.
Get your dancing shoes on with Magpie Dance's ambassadors for live interactive dance sessions and inclusive dance tutorials choreographed, performed and taught by people with learning disabilities.
Explore our third theme Common Good and the work of Enable Foundation and UK artists Ali Hodson and Pascal Anson who, through OK Dementia™ Festival and co-created design actions, aim to break the stigma and change norms about dementia.
Join Hong Kong Design Institute and Ravensbourne University London for Urban Futures, to explore creative responses to the challenges of urban development and related social issues.
Connect with our fourth theme Bridging Cities, where Professor Michael Bray leads film academy students from Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) and Central Saint Martins to co-create a short collage Confessions at the End of the Day, portraying the shared creative struggles and sentiments of acting students during lockdowns.
Professor Qian Liu from University of Warwick pairs up with Dr. Florin-Stefan Morar from City University of Hong Kong to present an intercultural interactive talk on how literature can be Lost in Translation, affecting issues of gender and inclusion.
And if you still have the energy, be teleported between London and Hong Kong by renowned UK creative agency Wind & Foster, working with dance companies Tavaziva from London and Hong Kong Ballet, to present interactive dance film Twin Cities, set in the two urban centres' underground train networks.
Sign up to our newsletter
All events are open to the public, hosted online and free of charge. Some events will require registration.
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