the art of ignoble hill

I wrote about ‘ignoble hill’, a large squatter area on the northern edge of Fanling, last year, and in that report, I included photos of two murals in what might whimsically be called ‘the main street’. However, there are others in side alleys, and this report is a comprehensive survey of everything I’ve come across when cycling through the area.

I should point out that ‘ignoble hill’ is not the area’s official name. I gave it this rather facetious sobriquet as a counterpoint to Noble Hill, an upmarket housing estate on the opposite side of Ma Sik Road, a busy four-lane dual carriageway that marks part of the northern and eastern boundaries of Fanling. This is a satellite photo of the area:

You can see that it is laid out in quite an orderly fashion. Ma Sik Road cuts across the northwest corner of the image, while the road that slices across the southeast corner provides the only access into the edge of the area for motor vehicles. The area to the southeast of this road is not part of ignoble hill.

The first mural that I encounter when cycling through the area is on the gable end of what I’ve conjectured is some kind of community building at the northern end of the area (marked by a blue X on the satellite photo). There are always cars parked here, so I’ve been unable to take a straight-on photo of the entire mural. This is my best effort to date:

…and this is a view of the left-hand end obscured by the parked car:

This is a real window!

My route then follows an excruciatingly steep path through the wooded area towards the red X, which marks the top of the main street. There are four murals on the walls of this alleyway, two of which didn’t exist when I wrote my original report. This is the first one you will encounter, on the left:

I’ve included the third photo to provide a better look at the dog enjoying an ice-cream cone, which I think is hilarious.

The next mural has a distinctly aquatic theme:

This mural is directly opposite the first of the new murals:

The second new mural can be glimpsed further down the alley, and the tower in the distance is part of Noble Hill. You can tell that it’s an upmarket estate by the height—only 15 storeys—and by the existence of penthouses.

The next two photos provide more detail of this new mural:

The Chinese characters on what I take are meant to be mah jong tiles—even though it takes four to play the game—read ‘si dor’, which is a transliteration of ‘store’. And there is a store at the top of the alley.

And this is the fourth mural:

The Chinese characters translate as ‘five street’, so there are formal addresses in ignoble hill!

Further down the main street, there is a cross-alley to the right that is navigable on a bike (most of the cross-alleys have flights of steps), and this is a mural that I spotted here:

I had thought that I could get everything in one shot, but the mural extends to the right, so I took an additional photo on a subsequent visit:

The end of the cross-alley is marked by the next mural:

This alleyway is extremely narrow, making it impossible to get it all in one photo, so here is what this mural looks like from the left:

…and from the right:

You will notice the sunlight on the left-hand end of the mural in the first photo, which obscured the detail of the chicken laying eggs on the dog in this photo and in my original photo from the left, so I took a replacement photo on my follow-up visit.

The final mural is located around the corner to the left at the top of the alley in the previous photo:

I’d only ever cycled past this mural in the past, and it is located above eye level, even on a bike, so I didn’t notice it. However, my follow-up visit was on foot, and my attention was drawn upwards by the red, white and blue vertical stripes, which may be intended as part of the work, as I walked past. The Chinese characters on the bottle proclaim the contents to be an orange juice drink that used to be popular with young children. In fact, all the items depicted in this mural can be recognized as children’s favourites.

Although all the artwork here is best described as ‘primitive’, I still find it interesting. I do wonder what the residents think though, because it is my guess that it is all the work of outside artists. It certainly brightens the place up.