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SPEAKER

Sze Ka Yan

Founder and Artistic Director, Fragrant Village

Sze Ka-yan is a Hong Kong-born sound artist and community practitioner. She graduated from the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, majoring in Sound Design and Music Recording, and later participated in an exchange programme at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama.

In 2014, she received a Best Music Design nomination at the Hong Kong Theatre Awards for her work on The Golden Dragon. Balancing artistic practice with community engagement, she served as a youth member of the Countryside Conservation Office (2021–2023). In 2024, she was awarded the Arts Administration Scholarship by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council and completed a Master in Nonprofit Management at Drexel University.

In 2016, she founded the non-profit Fragrant Village, preserving rural heritage through arts and archival research. Her curatorial projects include the “Village School Anthems” Art Exhibition and the “Sun & Moon Harmony: Sha Tau Kok Island-Hopping Art Tour.” In 2025, she published “Echoes of Village Voices,” documenting Hong Kong’s disappearing village school memories. In 2026, she presented the “Echoes of Village Voices” concert in Shanghai, bridging rural music traditions between Hong Kong and mainland China.

Sze Ka Yan

Organisation Description

Founded in 2016 and officially registered as a charity in 2023, Fragrant Village draws inspiration from the land, environment, and human stories of Hong Kong’s rural communities. Through music and artistic activities, it explores the power of sonic storytelling to reconnect people with place and memory.

Key projects include the collaborative album “Fragrant Village” (2016), the cross-media village school anthem exhibition (2019), the 1st “Fragrant Village Music Festival” (2019), the “World Music in Hong Kong” racial integration education programme (2022), the “Village School Anthems” art exhibition (2022), and the site-specific environmental music theatre “Village, my Home” (2023).

In 2026, the organisation expanded to mainland China with the “Echoes of Village Voices” concert and exhibition at Shanghai’s YOUNG Theatre, alongside ongoing projects like the “Sun & Moon Harmony Island-Hopping Art Tour”, the “Kat O Jiao Art Tour”, and the “Sha Tau Kok Cross-Generation Heritage Art Station.”

Fragrant Village serves as a platform for cultural exchange, supporting artists, engaging youth, and nurturing talent in collaboration with educational institutions.

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