HOW DOES ‘ART TRAVEL’ WORK IN HONG KONG——THE BOLD DREAM OF DAISY LI 

Curiosity is an inborn instinct. We are in love with the unknown places away from Hong Kong, whether they are cities, mountains or oceans. We love to meet people whom we have never met and treasure the moment of encounter. There is no love sincerer than that for good sleep, food, shopping, spa and fun when people travel. To travel is also to discover how much we dislike work, especially working for a living. While travel may be seen by some as a mere relaxation or indulgence, can we make it a time of self-improvement of one’s spiritual well-being?

Daisy is a multi-talented girl in Hong Kong——a ‘wordsmith’ who knows classical music, visual arts and gourmet food. She is my former editor.

Daisy and I met. She said, “After last summer’s adventure, I did learn and will plan more.” I wondered, “Do you mean falling in love?” She laughed, “I did it with my good friend Louis Ho but our adventure was organising an ‘art trip’ to Italy.”

Having clarified with Daisy. I can share with you what ‘art travel’ is all about. Apart from the usual itineraries on good food and city strolls, the trip was focused on visits to art museums, galleries and art spaces. Daisy recruited tourmates from her internet platform called HeyArt and there were about twenty people joining. Daisy said, “I am just a rookie. So, a professional tour organiser helped me apart from our charming Louis who is an art scholar. His wonderful docent tours in the different art and history museums of Venice, Florence and Rome took us to explore highlights of the art collections.”

I reacted, “Why did you have the idea of art travel?” She said, “Art travel is not uncommon elsewhere. In Beijing and Shanghai, there are now all sorts of art travels for the students, elderly, art investors and housewives. Hong Kong is relatively slow. The main theme of tours is still traditional, like about shopping, good fun and natural wonders. Most people do not know much about art, especially art in the western world. There are people in Hong Kong who do look for a spiritual need. Nothing is better than an art journey, if not a retreat, for a few days which rarefy our hectic life.”

I asked, “Have you got any advice for the young entrepreneurs who also want to fix art trips?” Daisy, optimistic and smiling, said, “I welcome more to support our art missions. Perhaps there are 4 things to be aware of. You must slowly attract and build up hard-core fans on the internet. It is the cheaper way! You must aim precisely at your correct targets. For me, I aim at the young and enlightened art lovers. Also, I do not agree that expensive advertising will be effective for a small business. For art travel, micro-marketing is the option. Then, price must be reasonable. You should not raise the price simply because art trip is unique or specialized. Knowledge and experience accumulation are important in building up your market leadership skills. The last thing is of course to find a very good art docent like Louis.”

Daisy told me that although she would not give up her writing and administrative jobs, she will devote more energy to art travel. She said, “I was moved greatly by the warm responses from the participants. They felt the ‘art shower’ has taken them to a higher spiritual level. Hopefully, I will organise 2 kinds of art travel: short trips to Asian countries and long-haul adventures to Europe or other distant places.”

I think of 2 kinds of people who visit other countries. A tourist sees what he has been told to see. The real traveller sees what he wants to see. Art lovers must be the latter kind.