Research & Impact
Vitruvian Bridge: Arts x Science Minds 2025
Continuing the creative vision of DnAesthetics, What Does the Brain Say? bridges the arts and sciences. Months of conversations and exchanges culminate in an exhibition that features artworks celebrating this cross-disciplinary collaboration. Focusing on the brain, the project explores the interconnectedness of the brain, nervous system, and emotions through artistic expression. Engage your brain, nerves, and emotions in this aesthetically moving experience.




Workshops



Introspection: What Does Your Emotion Say?
Ever wondered why the same moment / object can make one person afraid and another feel excited?
Step into the cross-disciplinary exhibition with the theme of human brains, What does the Brain Say?, and explore the amazing landscape of human emotions. Explore your emotions through art, and reflect on your responses as they are revealed.
Artist duo STICKYLINE and qualified clinical psychologist Charlene Lam, Ph.D. will guide you to discover why our feelings differ, how emotions can be understood, and how the arts help us make sense of what we feel.
Facilitators: STICKYLINE, Artist duo and Charlene Lam, Ph.D., Qualified Clinical Psychologist
Back to the Scribbling Stage: Reignite the Joy of Drawing
When was the last time you drew just for fun — no rules, no perfection, just your imagination running wild?
We invite you to rediscover that freedom and joy through a cross-disciplinary exhibition with the theme of human brains, What does the Brain Say?. You’ll be able to make your own expressive art piece using an unusual drawing tool.
Artist Dexter Lee and neuroscientist Dr Cora Lai will guide you to explore how fear is created and whether fear can be unlearnt, reconnecting us to curiosity and joy through the arts.
Facilitators: Dexter Lee, Artist and Dr Cora Lai, Neuroscientist
For Schools
For Public
For ages 6+
In Cantonese









Artists

Candice Keung graduated from The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (HKAPA) with a major in Applied Arts (Scenic Art). She interned at the Royal National Theatre, and is now a part-time teacher at the HKAPA.
In recent years, she has been involved in various arts projects, with works including glass paintings Nostalgia at the Yim Tin Tsai Arts Festival, artwork installation Animal Park in Oi! for Oi! Sunday, etc. Candice also takes part in various arts education initiatives, such as Stroll in Tai Po @ West Kowloon, stART Up Community Arts Project organised by the Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation, Standard Chartered Arts in the Park, and Jockey Club Arts-based Cross Curriculum Creative Learning Project organised by AFTEC.

Dexter Lee graduated from the Hong Kong Art School and was awarded the Best Artwork Award (Applied Arts) of the Year. Since his graduation work When we under the sun, Dexter has been exploring the relationship between humans and nature through his works.
In 2015, Dexter co-founded the “Sap Fong” arts education group with his friends, hoping to share the possibility of creating in daily life. Through community arts activities, creative course design, and art therapy services for young children, families, the elderly, and people with different abilities, Dexter believes that everyone can express their feelings and discover their own unique stories during the creative process.
In 2018, he participated in the mud-architecture project and filmed a short documentary in Taiwan. He participated in the Lai Chi Wo art project as an artist-in-residence and video producer from 2019 – 2024. His work Filtration from earth was selected to be exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 2021. His work Nest/Home was also exhibited in Lai Chi Wo in 2022.

STICKYLINE is a prominent creative duo comprising Mic Leong and Soilworm Lai from Hong Kong. Renowned for their distinctive, large-scale polyhedron sculptures, the duo is the mastermind behind the creative engineering, intricate mathematics and complex geometric structures in their work.
Crafting simple yet durable shapes using paper and metal, STICKYLINE combines technologies in kinetic, sound and light to enhance the experience of their work. The duo also conducts site-specific curation, explores experimental spatial experiences with minimalist geometric aesthetics and injects communal creative energy into their ever-evolving body of work.
Formed in 2011, STICKYLINE features a clientele ranging from international brands such as Hermès, Ralph Lauren, Puma, Givenchy, Mercedes-Benz, Leica and Audemars Piguet to local organisations such as M+, Design Trust, Landmark and Lee Gardens, as well as private commissions.
Scientists

Dr Cora Lai is an Associate Professor in the School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Hong Kong (HKU). She obtained her bachelor and doctoral degrees at HKU. She later joined the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine in the NYU Langone Health (New York, United States) for postdoctoral training. She has been working on intravital imaging of the mouse central nervous system in learning and memory, particularly in studying synaptic plasticity in fear associative learning and different psychiatric disease animal models with dendritic spine pathology.

Charlene Lam, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at The University of Hong Kong (HKU). She completed her doctoral training in affective neuroscience from HKU and King’s College London, and qualified as a clinical psychologist specialising in neuropsychology. She is passionate about interweaving basic neuroscience and clinical psychology together through translational research. Her research work focuses on identifying mechanisms contributing to pathological fear and anxiety, with the goal of developing targeted interventions for affect dysregulation and enhancing psychological well-being.
Acknowledgement



AFTEC reserves the right to postpone, cancel, modify the programme format or substitute members of the creative team
To avoid disturbance, latecomers will only be admitted at a suitable time during the workshop
The content of this programme does not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
