Portraits of Avenues
When it comes to the colonial history of Hong Kong, there are always many chapters on the history of Hong Kong Island. However, The late-developed Kowloon Peninsula was developed in the middle of the 19th century. Several of the main streets have a history of more than a hundred years, and their historical value and significance are no less than those on Hong Kong Island. Through historical photographs and documents, " Portraits of Avenues" draws out the history that has been covered up by the rush of time. Reencounter the forgotten people at the same time reconnect the memory from us.
Size of the Exhibit | /
Material | Digital Print
Profile
Siu Wai Hang is a photographer and a new-media artist. His work expresses solicitude for the society and reflects on photography, his primary medium. He was the recipient of Hong Kong Human Rights Art Prize (2018) and the WYNG Masters Award (2014 and 2016 respectively). He was also named as an ifva Emerging Talent (2016). His work was exhibited in Hong Kong, the United States, Taiwan and mainland China. Siu currently lives and works in Hong Kong, and holds teaching positions at various universities and art institutions.
Edward VIII, later Prince Edward, Duke of Windsor (23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Empire, and Emperor of India, from 20 January 1936 until his abdication on 11 December of that year.
Edward was created Prince of Wales on his sixteenth birthday, seven weeks after his father succeeded as king. As a young man, Edward served in the British Army during the First World War and undertook several overseas tours on behalf of his father.
In April 1922, Edward came to Hong Kong and visited the construction of a road connecting Mong Kok and Kowloon City. Due to this visit, the government named this road Prince Edward Road. In the 1930s, Prince Edward Road was extended to the area of Ngau Chi Wan.
Edward became king on his father's death in 1936. Only months into his reign, he caused a constitutional crisis by proposing to Wallis Simpson, an American who had divorced her first husband and was seeking a divorce from her second. The politics and peligios of the United Kingdom opposed the marriage, arguing a divorced woman with two living ex-husbands was politically and socially unacceptable as a prospective queen consort. Edward knew the Baldwin government would resign if the marriage went ahead, which could have forced a general election and would have ruined his status as a politically neutral constitutional monarch. When it became apparent he could not marry Wallis and remain on the throne, he abdicated. He was succeeded by his younger brother, George VI. With a reign of 326 days, Edward is one of the shortest-reigning monarchs in British history.
After his abdication, Edward was created Duke of Windsor. He married Wallis in France on 3 June 1937. Later that year, the couple toured Germany. During the Second World War, Edward was at first stationed with the British Military Mission to France, but after private accusations that he was a Nazi sympathiser, he was appointed Governor of the Bahamas. After the war, Edward spent the rest of his life in retirement in France. He and Wallis remained married until his death in 1972. Wallis died 14 years later.
Carnarvon
Henry Howard Molyneux Herbert, 4th Earl of Carnarvon (24 June 1831 – 29 June 1890), was a British politician and a leading member of the Conservative Party. He was twice (1866-1867 & 1874-1878) Secretary of State for the Colonies and also served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1855.
Knutsford
Henry Thurstan Holland, 1st Viscount Knutsford, (3 August 1825 – 29 January 1914), known as Sir Henry Holland, Bt, from 1873 to 1888 and as The Lord Knutsford from 1888 to 1895, was a British Conservative politician, best known for serving as Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1887 to 1892.
In 1870 Knutsford became assistant colonial undersecretary, serving until 1874, and in 1873, having succeeded his father as 2nd Baronet, he was elected to the House of Commons as a Conservative. In Lord Salisbury's first administration (1885–1886), Knutsford served as Financial Secretary to the Treasury and then as Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education. He served in this role again at the beginning of Salisbury's second ministry (1886–1887), but was soon promoted to Colonial Secretary (in January 1887).
As Colonial Secretary, Knutsford was largely concerned with South African affairs, being the Colonial Secretary who granted the charter for Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company in 1887. In 1888 he was elevated to the peerage as Baron Knutsford, of Knutsford in the County Palatine of Chester. In 1895, Knutsford was not included in Salisbury's new government. He was further honoured the same year when he was made Viscount Knutsford, of Knutsford in the County Palatine of Chester.
John Gardiner Austin, （ 7 August 1812 – 25 July 1900) was a British colonial administrator. He was Lieutenant-Governor of British Honduras 1864–1867, and Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong from 1868 to 1879, acting as Administrator (acting Governor) of the colony in 1877.
He served under three governors of Hong Kong in his 10 years services in Hong Kong Government. He also took part in the construction of The Mountain Lodge Guard House and the development of Kowloon Peninsula. The Austin Road was built in the 1870s, and many places in Hong Kong are named after him. During his tenure, British civil servants worked in Hong Kong were encouraged to learn Chinese, so as to improve the inconvenience of communication between officials and the public. Austin was awarded the CMG Medal in 1876 and was the first Colonial Secretary to receive this honor since the opening of Hong Kong. He retired from the Hong Kong government in 1878 and settled in the UK. He died in 1900.
Lieutenant-Colonel Sir Matthew Nathan, (3 January 1862 – 18 April 1939) was a British soldier and colonial administrator, who variously served as the Governor of Sierra Leone, Gold Coast, Hong Kong, Natal and Queensland. He was Under-Secretary for Ireland from 1914 to 1916, and was responsible, with the Chief Secretary, Augustine Birrell, for the administration of Ireland in the years immediately preceding the Easter Rising.
In 1903, Nathan was appointed as Governor of Hong Kong, a position he would serve until 1907. During his tenure, Nathan made use of his engineering background to establish a central urban planning and reconstruction policy. He built a major thoroughfare in the marshy area of the Kowloon Peninsula; The first section of Robinson Road was completed in 1861. It was the very first road built in Kowloon, after the land was ceded by the Qing dynasty government to the United Kingdom and made part of the crown colony in 1860. To avoid confusion with the Robinson Road on Hong Kong Island, the name was changed to Nathan Road in 1909, after Sir Matthew Nathan, the 13th Governor who served between 1904 and 1907. The construction of Kowloon-Canton Railway started under his period.
Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (3 February 1830 – 22 August 1903) was a British statesman. He served as prime minister three times for a total of over thirteen years.
Lord Robert Cecil was first elected to the House of Commons in 1854 and served as Secretary of State for India in Lord Derby's Conservative government 1866–1867. In 1874, under Disraeli, Salisbury returned as Secretary of State for India, and, in 1878, was appointed foreign secretary, and played a leading part in the Congress of Berlin. After Disraeli's death in 1881, Salisbury emerged as Conservative leader in the House of Lords, with Sir Stafford Northcote leading the party in the Commons. He succeeded William Ewart Gladstone as prime minister in June 1885, and held the office until January 1886. When Gladstone came out in favour of Home Rule for Ireland, Salisbury opposed him and formed an alliance with the breakaway Liberal Unionists, winning the subsequent general election. His great achievement in this term was obtaining the lion's share of new territory in Africa during the imperialistic Scramble for Africa, avoiding a war or serious confrontation with the other powers. He remained as prime minister until Gladstone's Liberals formed a government with the support of the Irish Nationalists at the 1892 general election. The Liberals, however, lost the 1895 general election, and Salisbury for the third and last time became prime minister. He led Britain to victory in a bitter, unpopular war against the Boers, and led the Unionists to another electoral victory in 1900. He relinquished the premiership to his nephew Arthur Balfour in 1902 and died in 1903. He was the last prime minister to serve from the House of Lords.
The road first appeared on the Rates List for 1897/8. John Wodehouse, 1st Earl of Kimberley gave his name to this road. He was a Secretary of State for the Colonies from July 1870 to February 1874 and served under the Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone. In 1905, the road was extended from Observatory Road to Austin Road.
Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon (Margaret Rose; 21 August 1930 – 9 February 2002) was the younger daughter of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, and the only sibling of Queen Elizabeth II.
After WWII, Margaret fell in love with Group Captain Peter Townsend. In 1952, her father died, her sister became queen, and Townsend divorced his wife. He proposed to Margaret early the following year. Many in the government believed that he would be an unsuitable husband for the Queen's 22-year-old sister, and the Church of England refused to countenance marriage to a divorced man. Margaret eventually abandoned her plans with Townsend and married photographer Antony Armstrong-Jones in 1960; the Queen made him Earl of Snowdon.
In 1966, Margaret visited to Hong Kong, Princess Margaret Road (Originally called Nairn Road) was renamed to commemorate she attended the finishing day of extension construction of the road.
Margaret was a controversial member of the British royal family. Her divorce in 1978 received much negative publicity, and she was romantically associated with several men. Her health gradually deteriorated in the final two decades of her life. She was a heavy smoker for most of her adult life and had a lung operation in 1985, a bout of pneumonia in 1993, and at least three strokes between 1998 and 2001. She died at King Edward VII's Hospital in London after suffering a final stroke
