20:20:20:20, 2047

Part of Lai Siu-Wai's 2047 series, this woodcut takes its title from a sequence of repeating 20s — most likely a digital clock or counter reading frozen at a moment of mechanical symmetry. The number 2047 carries weight for Hong Kong: the year the "One Country, Two Systems" framework established at the 1997 handover is scheduled to expire. The repetition of 20:20:20:20 evokes both the year 2020 and the visual stasis of a display that refuses to advance. Lai's woodcut practice typically employs flat planar carving and high-contrast relief inking, producing imagery that sits between found graphic ephemera (signage, calendars, screens) and personal record. The print extends his ongoing investigation of self-identity as a Hong Konger through the close attention to everyday objects — here, a glance at a clock readout made suddenly heavy by the date attached to it.