During this Lunar New Year, or ‘Spring Festival’ celebrating the beginning of the Year of the Dragon, I spent several days in Asia. On the last evening of the trip, before my flight returning from Hong Kong to the other side of the globe, I decided to spend the last few hours visiting the Hong Kong Museum of Art to view an exhibition co-organized by the Uffizi Galleries from Florence, Italy. The exhibition was titled ‘ The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: Titian and the Venetian Renaissance from the Uffizi ,’ displaying fifty works by some of the greatest painters in history, including Titian (Italian: Tiziano), Giorgione, Tintoretto, and Veronese from the Venetian School, spanning the 14th to the 18th century.
Hopping onto Hong Kong’s Star Ferry on the gentle waves and in the warm, moist breeze from the sea—a pleasantly nostalgic trip down memory lane in itself—I crossed to the Kowloon side of Victoria Bay. From there, I walked through the celebrating crowds to the main entrance of the Hong Kong Museum of Art, up the stairs, and toward the entrance of the exhibition, where Titian’s painting ‘Flora’, or goddess of spring, finally emerged. Standing in front of Titian’s paintings, next to the museum’s massive glass wall overlooking the brightly-lit festive Hong Kong waterfront, I found myself at the fascinating intersection of parallel worlds .
On one side, the timeless masterpieces of the Italian Renaissance; on the other, the fleeting moments of the New Y.