Dance company brings artistry across Hong Kong in campaign film

Hong Kong Dance Company (HKDC) officially launched its new brand campaign recently, opening a new dance season through a special short film. Themed Where We Land, Where We Dance, the production extends a dance venue into a space as large as a city. The film was produced in collaboration with Chan Kin Long, who won 'Best New Director' at the Hong Kong Film Awards last year for his work Hand Rolled Cigarette. 

Dedicated to promoting Chinese dance with contemporary artistic vision and Hong Kong character for 42 years, HKDC’s new film expresses creative force in the universal Chinese elements of water, fire, air, and earth. 

Yang Yuntao, Hong Kong Dance Company’s artistic director, explained the thoughts behind the campaign film: “This delicate short film is endowed with novel perspective from the viewpoint of a film director. We influence each other to go beyond what we both are accustomed to. The narrative of this work encapsulates quintessential quality of film art, delivering a dance work that transcends its form.” 

The four original elements of Chinese culture, “water, fire, air and earth”, are used as a metaphor for HKDC’s unique artistic style and mission to create innovative Chinese dance productions with Hong Kong characteristics. 

Through the camera and the flowing movements of dancers, the video not just captures how they express their inner spirits and how their bodies respond to mother nature and the environments instinctively, but is fused with distinctive cultural icons from the city, such as neon signs with the character for 'water' in Chinese calligraphy, Tai Hang’s fire dragon dance, local street posters, building’s rooftop signifying 'earth' from the ancient Chinese I Ching.

Chan Kin Long explains, “When creative motives, moving images and different forms of art come together, they entice a riveting aftertaste. How intuitive expression of our souls ties to our natural surroundings sets the tone for this creative partnership. Imagining dance artists and us from film art are in our own processes of spiritual refinement. We are from different artistic camps, nevertheless we share a common language in our imagination for art.”

Production & Artistic Team
Director: Chan Kin Long
Artistic Director: Yang Yuntao
Artistic Coordinator: Huang Lei
Assistant Director: Lee Hoi Wah
Art director: Gary Tam
Producer: Isabella Lam
Director of Photography: FUKPAKJIM
Music Composer: Lawrence Lau
Still Photographer: Karlson Tsang
Designer: sunny@studiowmw
Behind-the-scenes: Leung Ho sing, Fung yiu man, Lam ting hin, Chiu sung tat, Lau Chun Sing
Dance Artists: Pan Linjuan, Ho Ho-fei, Lee Chia Ming, Huang Haiyuan, Ong Tze Shen, Pan Zhenghuan, Ng Ka-ling, Chou Jo-yun, Huang Wenjie, Tong Chi-man, Ho Gi-lam, He Yongning, Lai Wan-chi, Tai Wing-chun, Tai Chun-u, Lee Chun-hin, Lo Sum-yu, Lee Wai-yan, Liu Ya-lien, Ng Yuen-man, Tong Hai My, Wan Nga-yu
High Speed Camera Team: Free Run Production, Kelvin Fan, Silvia Ng
Drone Camera: Kwan Ming Fai
Assistant Set Designer: Joan Leung
Stylists: Mani Chan, Tiffany Liu
Styling Assistants: Chesney Lau, Winky Wong, Amy Tam
Make Up Artists: Angel Mok, Carmen Chung, April Huang
Hair Stylists: Shirley Mak, Ryan Ma, Shue Lai
Stunt Team: Chan Chun Fung MJ, Wong Shui Ki Suki
Fire Dragon Team: Tête-de-Lion

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