Museums and the Campus Ecosystem

The University of Hong Kong (HKU) integrated information database · Module 05: Campus (supplement)

Tucked into the HKU campus are two museums of real weight: one is Hong Kong's oldest continuously operating museum — the University Museum and Art Gallery (UMAG), whose collection spans Chinese art from the Neolithic period to the Qing dynasty; the other is the newer Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum, home to more than 50,000 specimens. This article follows two threads — "the collections" and "ecology/nature" — taking stock of HKU's exhibition spaces and its campus natural environment.

A note on scope: this article focuses on museum collections and species. The architectural stories of the buildings housing these museums (such as the Fung Ping Shan Building and the Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building) are covered in <Iconic Buildings and Landmarks> and <Campus Buildings and Places Directory>; the location of off-campus ecological sites (the Swire Institute of Marine Science at Cape d'Aguilar) is covered in <Campus Geography>.

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# 0. A Quick Guide to HKU's Campus Exhibition Spaces

Positioning: HKU is home to both "Hong Kong's oldest art museum (UMAG)" and "the territory's first biodiversity museum (HKBM)". The former is known for its Chinese art collection and academic depth; the latter for its specimen collection and environmental education.

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# 1. The University Museum and Art Gallery (UMAG): Hong Kong's Oldest Museum

# 1.1 Museum History: From the Fung Ping Shan Library to UMAG

The origins of the University Museum and Art Gallery trace back to the Fung Ping Shan Building. According to the museum itself:

• In 1932, the Fung Ping Shan Building (originally the Fung Ping Shan Library) was completed^※;
• In 1953, the "Museum of Chinese Art and Archaeology" was established^※;
• On 4 April 1955, the museum opened to the public^※;
• On 31 January 1964, it was renamed the "Fung Ping Shan Museum"^※;
• On 1 July 1994, it merged to form the University Museum and Art Gallery (UMAG)^※;
• On 8 November 1996, the T.T. Tsui Building opened^※;
• In 2018, the Fung Ping Shan Building was declared a declared monument^※.

(All the above per UMAG·History; the Fung Ping Shan Building's declared-monument status also appears on AMO·HKU Heritage)

According to UMAG, the museum is "the oldest continuously operated museum in Hong Kong"^※ (per UMAG·History). This is perhaps the most significant "first" among the University's cultural facilities.

# 1.2 The Collection: From the Neolithic to the Twenty-First Century

According to the museum, over more than seventy years UMAG has built up a diverse collection comprising ceramics and bronzes dating from the Neolithic period (c. 7000–c. 2100 BC) through to the Qing dynasty (1644–1911), as well as traditional and modern paintings from the Ming dynasty (1368–1644) to the twenty-first century^※ (per UMAG·History). In more detail:

• Bronzes: according to UMAG, the museum holds ritual vessels from the Shang (c. 1600–c. 1100 BC) and Western Zhou (c. 1100–771 BC) dynasties, as well as a collection of bronze mirrors spanning the Eastern Zhou (770–256 BC) to the Tang dynasty^※ (per UMAG·History).
• Nestorian crosses: according to UMAG, the museum holds the largest known collection of Nestorian crosses from the Mongol period (Yuan dynasty, 1271–1368) in the world^※ (per UMAG·History). This is one of UMAG's most internationally renowned special collections.
• Paintings: according to UMAG, the museum holds Chinese ink paintings from the Ming dynasty to the present day, as well as twentieth-century Chinese oil paintings^※ (per UMAG·History).

# 1.2.1 The Nestorian Crosses: How a British Postal Official's Collection Became Part of UMAG

Behind this "largest in the world" collection of Yuan-dynasty Nestorian crosses lies a collection history with more than a hint of the serendipitous. According to UMAG's collection page, the group comprises 966 objects, mostly bronze, with museum accession number HKU.B.1961.0243^※ (per UMAG·Nestorian Crosses). These bronze Nestorian crosses were cast in the Yuan dynasty (1272–1368) in the Ordos region of Inner Mongolia, mostly measuring between 3 and 8 centimetres across. Flat, plaque-like, with loops on the reverse, they are thought to have been worn on the person and to have doubled as personal seals.

According to publicly compiled accounts, the collection was originally amassed by F. A. Nixon, who served as British Postal Commissioner in Beijing in the 1930s and 1940s and gathered these Nestorian artefacts across north China during his tenure. The collection was subsequently purchased by the Lee Hysan Estate Company and donated to HKU in 1961 — UMAG's collection page credits the gift in its credit line as "Gift of Lee Hysan Estate Company". From 10 June 2015, UMAG put more than 700 re-ordered Nestorian crosses on public display, alongside an international academic conference on Nestorian studies and public lectures — the most significant public showing of this special collection in recent years. From a British postal official's private holdings in north China, to acquisition by a Hong Kong family company, to permanent residence in HKU's collections, the journey of these crosses is itself a miniature history of the modern movement of Chinese antiquities between East and West.

# 1.3 The Buildings

UMAG now occupies two buildings: the Fung Ping Shan Building (1932; declared monument) and the T.T. Tsui Building (opened 1996). The architectural story of the Fung Ping Shan Building (the red brick, the donor Fung Ping Shan, its 2018 declared-monument status) is covered in <Iconic Buildings and Landmarks>. According to the museum, a lift was installed in the Fung Ping Shan Building in 2013^※ (per UMAG·History) to improve accessibility at this declared monument.

# 1.2.2 The "Invisible" Backbone of the Collection: The Conservation Laboratory

A museum operating continuously for over seventy years depends on professional conservation support. According to HKU Libraries, HKU set up an in-house conservation laboratory in its "Preservation Centre" in 2010, making it the only academic institution in Hong Kong with dedicated paper/artefact conservation facilities^※; the centre employs four conservation specialists and four conservation technicians handling basic to complex conservation work on the University's Western and Oriental rare books, archives and manuscripts. UMAG itself launched the "UMAG_STArts" initiative in 2020, exploring the symbiosis between science, technology and art, bringing interdisciplinary approaches to art history, heritage conservation and emerging technologies, and has worked with researchers in related fields to study the transfer and preservation techniques of Chinese ceramics. This "behind-the-scenes" conservation work is the institutional basis that allows UMAG to keep displaying objects spanning thousands of years without their succumbing to age and decay.

# 1.3.1 Positioning: Not Just a Storehouse — A Teaching and Public Platform

UMAG positions itself as more than a place to "preserve artefacts". According to the museum's vision statement, UMAG is committed to "creating accessible art and cultural experiences", fostering public appreciation of the arts and strengthening the cultural values of Hong Kong society^※. The same page describes how UMAG, on the one hand, supports cross-faculty academic research and teaching at HKU, and on the other, offers the public displays of its Chinese art and culture collections, trains museum professionals (through internship and fellowship programmes), promotes traditional, modern and contemporary art education, and fosters international cultural exchange — the museum aspires to a leadership role in art education in Hong Kong. This self-positioning shows that UMAG functions both as an internal teaching resource for HKU and as part of Hong Kong's wider cultural ecosystem — its role extends well beyond that of a mere "campus museum".

# 1.4 Permanent and Rotating: A Museum that Keeps Operating

As "the oldest continuously operating museum in Hong Kong", UMAG's vitality does not rest on its permanent collection alone; rotating themed exhibitions keep it alive. In the past two years alone, the museum has staged 「奇妙江山：中国山水画探索」 (Fantastic Lands: In Search of the Chinese Landscape), a joint exhibition of Japanese printmakers Akira Kurosaki and Tadayoshi Nakabayashi (October 2024 – February 2025), a documentary exhibition of German photographer Heinz von Perckhammer's 1920s Beijing imagery, and a watercolour-and-photography exhibition by local artist David Clarke^※. This curatorial rhythm — "permanent Chinese artefacts + rotating modern/contemporary special exhibitions" — makes UMAG at once a historical antiquities museum and an active participant in contemporary art and photographic history. According to the museum, admission is generally free, though some special events or workshops may carry a charge^※.

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# 2. The Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum (HKBM): Natural History and Specimens

The other display venue on campus is the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum, which sits within the Faculty of Science and is housed in the Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building.

According to the HKU Faculty of Science, the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum is the first museum in Hong Kong dedicated to biodiversity, holding more than 50,000 specimens and constituting the largest and most comprehensive biodiversity collection in the territory^※ (per HKBM·HKU Faculty of Science). According to the museum, some of its specimens were collected between the 1920s and 1970s and are today of species that are under threat, forming an important natural heritage to be handed down to future generations^※ (per HKBM·HKU Faculty of Science).

# 2.1 The Collection's Origins: Specimens with No Recorded Donor

The collection history of the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum predates its formal opening by nearly a century. According to the museum's own history page, the story goes back to 1923, when specimens collected by successive generations of HKU teaching staff, researchers and students gradually accumulated, becoming the foundational material for research and teaching across the biological sciences; the earliest specimens can be traced to the early 1920s^※ (per Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum·The History). Notably, no records survive of who initiated or donated to establish this initial collection^※ — the specimens thus look less like a single donor's one-off gift than the natural accretion of generations of HKU field research. In 1998, the School of Biological Sciences moved into its present premises, and the collection moved with it to the south wing of the second floor of the Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building, where it remains^※ (per the same source).

# 2.2 Formal Opening: May 2021

It was not until recently that this collection, accumulated over nearly a century, formally opened to the public as a "museum". According to the museum's website, the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum officially opened to the public on 22 May 2021^※ (per Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum·The History), managed by a team of experts from the School of Biological Sciences and supported by scientists and partners from multiple fields. From scattered specimens in the 1920s, to systematic organisation in 1998, to a formal opening in 2021 — this timeline shows that HKBM is not a new museum "built all at once", but rather teaching material accumulated over nearly a century that finally "graduated" into a public natural-history museum. The museum describes its core mission as a balance of research, education and conservation, and frames its educational narrative against the backdrop of an estimated more than 30,000 species^※ in Hong Kong's ecosystems. The museum also welcomes group and individual visits by appointment, and has run public engagement events such as an "ant photography competition", marrying its specimen collection with citizen science and nature education.

The Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building that houses the museum, according to HKU Giving, was gifted by Mrs. Kadoorie in memory of her late husband, Lord Lawrence Kadoorie, and opened on 17 January 2000, covering zoology, botany, ecology and biodiversity research^※ (per HKU Giving·Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building). The building's architectural story appears in <Campus Buildings and Places Directory>.

Note: the name "Kadoorie" appears twice in connection with HKU, but refers to two different entities — the Kadoorie Biological Sciences Building, donated by Mrs. Kadoorie in memory of her late husband and housing the Biodiversity Museum; and the Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden (Kadoorie Centre, see §3.3 below), founded at Shek Kong in the New Territories with the support of the Kadoorie brothers themselves. Both reflect the Kadoorie family's support for the natural sciences at HKU, but the donors, locations and institutional natures differ; this database lists them separately and does not conflate the two.

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# 3. Campus Ecology and the Natural Environment

The HKU main campus is embedded in the hillside of the western part of Hong Kong Island, bounded to the north by Lung Fu Shan Country Park and to the south by Pok Fu Lam and the coast. Its ecological resources come both from urban greenery and from the adjacent countryside and sea.

# 3.1 Lung Fu Shan and the Hillside Greenery

The northern fringe of the main campus is Lung Fu Shan. According to Wikipedia, the HKU main campus is situated at the foot of Lung Fu Shan in the Bonham Road and Pok Fu Lam Road area^※ (per Campuses of HKU·Wikipedia). According to the HKU Estates Office, the hilly terrain around Pok Fu Lam gives the campus "a distinctive landscape", with a number of well-loved gardens and courtyards^※ (per HKU Estates·Our Campuses). These gardens and courtyards, set against the red-brick declared monuments, are part of the texture of the HKU campus.

According to Wikipedia, Lung Fu Shan Country Park was designated on 18 December 1998^※, and is home to over a hundred species of birds and butterflies — the ecological hinterland of the "hills behind" the main campus. HKU and the government's Environmental Protection Department jointly run the Lung Fu Shan Environmental Education Centre here — according to the centre, it opened in April 2008 as a partnership between the EPD and HKU, the first such partnership between government and a local tertiary institution^※, using education to promote nature conservation and bridging university, government and community. Since 2017 the centre has run a "BioBlitz" citizen-science event — the first edition drew around 100 participants and volunteers, who recorded 151 species in Lung Fu Shan Country Park under the guidance of 11 experts; the centre reports that 144 species of birds have been recorded on Lung Fu Shan to date. The centre also runs regular citizen-science projects such as the "Black Kite Public Census", involving the public in long-term monitoring of local species. HKU's "backing onto Lung Fu Shan" location (see <Campus Geography>) is thus not merely a scenic description; it is the physical foundation for an entire suite of environmental education and citizen-science programmes.

# 3.2 Cape d'Aguilar: The Swire Institute of Marine Science and Coastal Ecology

HKU's marine ecology research base sits at Cape d'Aguilar on the southern tip of Hong Kong Island. According to the HKU Faculty of Science, the Swire Institute of Marine Science (SWIMS) was originally conceived by Prof Brian S. Morton with the support of the Swire Group, and was officially opened in 1990 by the Chairman of Swire and then-Vice-Chancellor Prof Wang Gungwu^※, with initially just three academic staff, two postdoctoral fellows and over ten postgraduate students; as demand for marine science research grew, it was expanded in 1994 and renamed the Swire Institute of Marine Science. The institute sits on the shore of the Cape d'Aguilar Marine Reserve, Hong Kong's only marine protected area, and focuses on topics such as habitat destruction and restoration in coastal ecosystems, global change and adaptation, and overexploitation and sustainability. In 2021, with support from the Swire Trust, the institute completed an extension and renovation of its main building to accommodate its growing community of researchers and postgraduate students.

# 3.3 Shek Kong: The Kadoorie Centre

In Shek Kong, in the New Territories, HKU maintains the Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden (Kadoorie Centre). According to the HKU Estates Office, the centre covers about 10 hectares^※ (per HKU Estates·Our Campuses), providing HKU with land for countryside, agricultural and ecological research. According to publicly compiled accounts, the centre was founded in June 1986 through a donation from the Kadoorie brothers (Lord Kadoorie and his brother Sir Horace Kadoorie)^※, with roots that reach back to the "Kadoorie Agricultural Aid Association" established in 1951 and an experimental farm set up at Shek Kong in 1956, initially aimed at helping local farmers and demobilised Gurkha soldiers improve their farming techniques and incomes. In 1995, the Legislative Council of Hong Kong passed an ordinance formally establishing the "Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden Corporation", and the centre has since gradually transformed into a nature conservation, organic agriculture and environmental education institution — a shift from "agricultural extension" to "ecological conservation" that echoes, in an interesting way, HKU's own trajectory from colonial college to modern comprehensive research university.

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# 3.1 Two Museums, Two Kinds of Nature: A Summary

Setting UMAG and the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum side by side reveals a telling contrast within HKU's cultural facilities: one devoted to "humanistic nature" — telling the story of Chinese art and civilisation through bronzes, ceramics and ink paintings; the other devoted to "biological nature" — recording the rise and fall of Hong Kong's local ecosystems through specimens and species. The former's collection stems from the deliberate gifts of generations of collectors and donors (Fung Ping Shan, the Lee Hysan Estate Company); the latter's origins are, by contrast, almost anonymous — accumulated unconsciously through the fieldwork of successive cohorts of teachers and students, with no record even of who initiated it. This contrast, in a way, echoes the ecological map of HKU described in Section 3: from the Lung Fu Shan Environmental Education Centre at the campus's northern foot, to the Swire Institute of Marine Science at Cape d'Aguilar in the south, to the Kadoirie Farm at Shek Kong in the New Territories — HKU's natural science education facilities likewise display this "scattered across the city's hillsides" geography (see <Campus Geography>). Though the museums and ecological outposts are dispersed, together they constitute HKU's ongoing record, along both the humanistic and the biological threads, of this city and this land.

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# 4. Not Found / To Be Verified

• The specific registration of "Old and Valuable Trees" on the HKU campus: this search did not find authoritative official figures for a tree-by-tree register of old and valuable trees on the HKU campus → marked "not found"; no specific counts are guessed at.
• The initiator and donor of the Hong Kong Biodiversity Museum's earliest specimens: the museum's website explicitly states "no records survive of who initiated or donated to establish the collection" → this article records this faithfully as "no records", without speculating on names.
• The precise provenance details of the Nestorian cross collection (the specific years of Nixon's collecting, the exact year of the Lee Hysan Estate Company's purchase): public sources record only the approximate timeframe of "the 1930s and 1940s" and "donated to HKU in 1961"; year-by-year details await further sources.

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