Exhibition: A Journal of the Plague Year. Fear, ghosts, rebels. SARS, Leslie and the Hong Kong story, 16 May - 20 July 2013, Hong Kong

Lam Qua, Portrait no 48.Yang Kang, 1830-1850. Oil painting. Courtesy Yale University, Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library.

Independent art space in Hong Kong, Para Site, explore the changing stories of a city in a new exhibition A Journal of the Plague Year. Fear, ghosts, rebels. SARS, Leslie and the Hong Kong story over the may to July period.

Showcasing an impressive list of internationally established talents and local artists, the exhibition threads its way through the "disparate though interconnected" visions and revisions of Hong Kong (places, spaces and people) in the wake of epidemic, economic and political instability and waves of human migration which occurred as a result of the SARS outbreak of 2003. Pathogenesis, politics and xenophobia meet the funereal and civic solidarity in strange combinations in this often overlooked tale of the last decade of Hong Kong.

"When the city became the epicenter of the most significant airborne epidemic in recent years - the SARS crisis of 2003 - the unparalleled shutdown of the city and the atomisation of society in quarantined segments lead to an unexpected shift in the political awareness of the Hong Kong citizenry. ... After that moment, the image of a de-politicised and soullessly pragmatic commercial hub could not anymore tell the whole story about Hong Kong."

As the contributors come from an array of professional backgrounds, including academics, journalism, film-making and the more creative arts, the responses to this quite challenging theme promises to be both varied and intriguing. A Journal of the Plague Year also includes two outdoor performances by Lygia Pape on 17 and 25 May. Check the Para Site website for further details.