In Hong Kong, horse racing has always been more than sport. It is part of the city’s social fabric, from the sound of the grandstand to the flash of jockeys’ silks on the turf. As the new season begins, attention returns to the racecourse. Yet racing also has its own visual language, shaped by colour, materials, movement and craft.
The Hong Kong Jockey Club is closely tied to that world, but its role extends well beyond the track. Its support for cultural institutions, heritage conservation, arts education and creative practice has helped shape Hong Kong’s cultural life over several decades. The Hong Kong Palace Museum, Tai Kwun, the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts and the Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre in Shek Kip Mei are among the projects and institutions linked to its support.
Tai Kwun is one of the clearest examples. The former Central Police Station compound is now home to exhibitions, performances and public programmes. Within the site, Herzog & de Meuron’s JC Cube occupies a former laundry building. The performance venue seats around 200 people. Its simple, contemporary form sits alongside the surrounding historic buildings, creating a measured contrast between old and new. Since it opened in 2018, Tai Kwun has recorded more than 20 million visits. The figure reflects not only the popularity of the site, but also its place in Hong Kong’s cultural life.
The Club’s more recent initiatives also cover a broad range of art forms. At the Hong Kong Palace Museum, “The Art Plaza Project” brought together six Hong Kong artists and an architect. Their sculptures, multimedia works and interactive installations drew on the Chinese garden through bamboo, metal, fabric, light and moving elements. The works reinterpreted traditional garden ideas rather than reproducing them directly.
Elsewhere, “The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: Meet Mona Lisa & Portraying the Renaissance” used Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa as its starting point. The exhibition brought together Renaissance works, contemporary art, multimedia and interactive displays, offering visitors a different way to engage with a well-known painting.
Can the language of racing be translated into objects for the home? That is the starting point for “When Art Meets Horse Racing”, an exhibition led by Clement Cheng, founder of Clement C. Studio. The project does not lean on familiar horse motifs. Instead, it draws on details from the racing world, including the colour and pattern of jockeys’ silks, the form of saddlery, the texture of stable timber and the shape of horseshoes.
The Making of a Racing Aesthetic
Cheng is an architect, interior designer, educator and horse owner. He approaches racing with both a designer’s eye and firsthand knowledge of the sport. His interest lies not only in the action on the track, but also in the systems and objects that support it. Silks need to be recognised at speed. Saddles are designed around the movement of horse and rider. Horseshoes are fitted according to a horse’s hoof, gait and training requirements. In the stable, timber partitions, light and daily routines create an order that is very different from the noise of race day.
Cheng and his collaborators visited stables, observed farriers at work and spoke with trainers, stable staff, jockeys and racing enthusiasts. The works in the exhibition are informed by those encounters. Rather than presenting racing as a decorative theme, they use its materials and working details as the basis for art and furniture.
Racing in Four Forms
Deconstructed Silks – Korean artist Daun Jeong uses racing silks from the Aesthete stable, together with a winning whip once used by Zac Purton, as the basis for a sculptural work. The colours and graphic patterns of jockeys’ silks are broken down and rearranged, moving from a practical form of identification on the track to an artwork designed for interior space.
The Stall Screen – the Stall Screen takes its reference from stable partitions and changing light. Rather than recreate a stable, the room divider draws on its sense of rhythm, shadow and enclosure for a contemporary interior.
The Horseshoe Ring Table – the table legs are made from layers of real horseshoes, referring to the movement and structure of a horse’s limbs. A circular horseshoe frame on the tabletop supports handmade ceramic vessels by Karena Lam. The piece brings together the weight of forged metal and the softer finish of clay.
The ZP Chair – developed by Cheng with Zac Purton and Japanese furniture designer Tatsushige Nakamura, The ZP Chair takes its cue from the four-beat rhythm of a horse’s gallop. Its angled legs suggest movement without becoming too literal. A small compartment in the side of the chair holds silks associated with notable horses from Purton’s career.
Beyond the Finish Line
Racing is often associated with speed, scale and spectacle. “When Art Meets Horse Racing” looks beyond the track to the materials and forms that shape the sport. Saddlery, horseshoes, stable timber and jockeys’ silks become starting points for furniture and art.
As the racing season begins, the exhibition offers another way to look at a familiar Hong Kong pastime. It focuses on the craft, materials and visual details around the sport, showing how racing culture can take on a new role beyond the racecourse.
