Walls and Roads: Openness, Creativity, the Belt and Road in Image & Thought

How do roads, railways and networks reshape the ways in which people live, work, imagine and connect? The University of Hong Kong’s Communications and Public Affairs Office invites you to the "Walls and Roads: Openness, Creativity, and the Belt and Road in Image and Thought", a timely public dialogue that brings photography, anthropology, urban design, globalisation and public communication into conversation.

Anchored by Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Mr Liu Heung Shing’s new work on the human landscape of connection along Belt and Road routes, the event asks audiences to look beyond infrastructure as an object of engineering. It considers the people, skills, communities, memories and possibilities that make a connection meaningful.

Liu will be joined by Professor David A. Palmer, jointly appointed by HKU’s Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences and Department of Sociology; Professor Alain J. F. Chiaradia, Associate Professor and Deputy Head of HKU’s Department of Urban Planning and Design; and Dr Joseba Estévez, Research Assistant Professor at HKU’s Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Here, evidence, curiosity and careful listening can move beyond headlines towards textured and responsible understanding of the world we share.

Together, the speakers will explore what images, maps, fieldwork and public narratives can reveal—and conceal—about mobility, access, openness and cross-cultural encounter. The discussion will invite students and the wider public to ask: Who is connected, on what terms, and whose experience is visible?

Date: Thursday, September 17, 2026

Time: 3:00pm – 4:30 pm

Venue: Convocation Room, MB218, 2/F, Main Building, HKU

Language: English

This event is organised by the Communications and Public Affairs Office, The University of Hong Kong.

Views and opinions expressed are those of the speakers and participants, and, unless expressly stated to the contrary, they do not reflect the opinion, position or official policy of The University of Hong Kong.

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