Chris Kyme’s Postcard from Hong Kong: An off the wall idea

Pictured above: Jason Dembski – driving people up the wall.

Chris Kyme (pictured below) continues his ‘Postcard from Hong Kong’ series, this time exploring the city’s street art scene and the enduring appeal of hand-painted walls.

Just recently I met and had a chat with a nice gent in Hong Kong, Jason Dembski, who is Co-founder of HKwalls. A local non-profit organisation that celebrates street art in Hong Kong. Supporting local and international artists through events like an annual street art festival as well as other events.

The whole idea is to promote street art, and more than anything, brighten the city up. All good with me, the Hong Kong public is not known for its cheerfulness so anything which adds a bit of colour to our streets can’t be a bad thing, aside for the general visual pollution that masquerades as outdoor advertising these days.

What I also love about this is the opportunities it gives to local artists to express themselves across these large urban canvasses. It’s a win win.

But it got me thinking. Remember the age-old tradition of painted ads on walls? You can still see remnants of them when you amble through country towns in various parts of the world, especially across Europe. When I’m lecturing on the history of advertising to students here, we look at outdoor as one of the oldest forms of advertising. Whether that’s ancient Roman ads promoting anything from wine to politicians, Egyptian ads for lost slaves or late 19th century ads for brands like Coca Cola or Dr Pepper.

Wall ads – the Romans were always at it.

Before the sophisticated and industrialised methods for mass production printing, ads got painted on walls. So why not today? The answers to that are probably pretty obvious, but with Jason’s passion for brightening up dull concrete and brick spaces, I started wondering – could we introduce the idea of doing that for brands? Oatly, for one, seem to have been making pretty good use of the odd wall here and there in recent years.

Jason is actually not from advertising, he trained as an architect. I asked him how did he go from designing walls to designing what goes on them.

“I’ve always been fascinated by graffiti and street art, especially what motivates people to put their work out in the streets for everyone to see. In late 2009, I moved to Hong Kong. I was working long hours, but I wanted to explore the city. I immediately noticed the local street art scene-artists like Start From Zero and Graphic Airlines had posters and stencils all over the place. These were mixed in with plumber phone numbers, works by other local artists, and a good amount of international street art. Seeing the work in the streets was my way of learning about it.

I found this juxtaposition of architecture, cultures, and street art really fascinating. So, I started documenting it. I photographed the pieces, kept a small album on Facebook, and that eventually led to creating a website documenting street art and graffiti in Hong Kong. Over time, this hobby turned into a real passion.

I started going to exhibitions, tracking down pieces, and getting to know the scene. I was meeting artists and venturing into abandoned buildings or concrete rivers where they spent time. When well-known international artists visited Hong Kong, they might do something small on the street, but locals would often take them to these hidden spots. I was finding works by American, Australian, British, and Hong Kong artists painted side by side, but the general public never got to see them.

I kept photographing them, sharing them online, and naturally just became more involved. I started helping photograph events, hanging out with artists when they came to town, and building a community. It really took shape organically.”

So I put my idea to Jason, well, my question really – is there room for selling wall spaces for commercial purposes and getting brands to create wall ads, old-school style? Turns out he’s already been thinking in this direction.

“In parallel to HKwalls, which is fundamentally about culture and giving artists opportunities and creative freedom, our success created a demand for client-focused work. To handle this, we have a commercial arm that keeps us alive and ensures we can pay ourselves and the artists.

Throughout the year, we paint murals or curate artwork for private clients, restaurants, offices, brand campaigns and even government projects. As part of this side of the business, we are currently in the process of re-launching and branding this segment of client focused work under the name Hand-painted HK. It runs parallel to HKwalls, utilising many of the same artists to create bespoke, hand-crafted artworks for clients.”

The Adidas x HKwalls run – Art of Hard Thirteen.

Now this is something I love. I have a feeling that if clients were paying to have hand-painted, artistic ads on walls, we might see more creative use of spaces, rather than just typical mainstream advertising. We see great examples of ambient media in award shows, and brands like Oatley have more recently done some very cool work on walls. Jason echoes this and his message to potential clients reflects what good agencies are telling their clients every day whatever the medium.

“Be brave. Be open, both in your budget and in your mind. We absolutely love clients and partners who trust the artist’s vision and are willing to embrace new things.”

The biggest challenges facing HKwalls generally come down to budgets and space. Finding sponsorship is always the primary hurdle. They have had support in the past. For example, pre-COVID, there were some strong brand partnerships. Vans, for example, supported the annual street art festival financially and culturally for six festivals, allowing for complete creative freedom.

Post COVID Sino Group has been a huge supporter of HKwalls in a number of ways, especially through their digital program, providing artists space to share their work on the Iconic LED screens at Tsim Sha Tsui Centre and Empire Centre for the last four years. And Jason says they have also just locked down another year of collaboration with creative hub and mixed use venue PMQ, giving the HKwalls Festival some stability, being able to call PMQ home for the next festival.

However, since COVID, budgets for the client and commercial work have been withdrawn somewhat. Jason is looking to build more longer lasting brand partnerships.

“These long lasting relationships are really important in allowing us to think into the future. Last year was quite tough and slow for us, although this year has been better. We hope with the launch of Hand-painted HK, that has the mission statement in the name, combined with our existing track record things will continue to improve as we make Hand-painted HK a household name just like HKwalls.”

Speaking from a selfish, creative advertising perspective, I would love to see briefs going into agencies with the challenge of doing great old-style wall ads that stand out and generate social media coverage. Why not? Come of you brand owners, step up, maybe my idea is more concrete than it sounds (sorry).

Local artist Enoch Wong giving it some ‘wallitutude’.

Read Chris Kyme’s most recent Postcard’s from Hong Kong below:
Cannes? Let’s bring the kids with us!
The importance of training
Coming home
Back to the future
Are you up for the Kam Funs?
Over qualified or over the hill?