Until May 18
One hundred galleries from 20 countries will take part in ART HK 08, Hong Kong’s first major art fair in a decade. The inaugural edition of what its organizers hope will be an annual affair has attracted exhibitors from New York, London, Paris and other traditional centres of art along with Makati City, Mumbai, Shanghai and the Fragrant Harbour itself. Thousands of works of art, including pieces by Andy Warhol and Pablo Picasso along with up-and-coming contemporary artists, will be on display at the HK Convention & Exhibition Centre’s Halls 1A and 1B through to May 18. The five-day fair’s programme will also include educational talks. Opening hours on May 15-17 are 11am-7pm and 11am-5pm on May 18. Tickets valid from May 15-18 are $150 from HK Ticketing, 31 288 288 while $50 concessions are available at the fair. For further details about the first ART HK, go to www.hongkongartfair.com

May 15-17 and 22-24
In 1933, Lea Papin and her sister Claire brutally murdered their employer and her daughter in Le Mans, the French town best known for its 24-hour sports-car endurance race. Fourteen years later, controversial author and political activist Jean Genet based Les Bonnes (The Maids), a play about power, cruelty and human relationships that erases any clear borderline between truth and imagination, on those macabre events. May 15-17 and May 22-24 will see a co-presentation of this dramatic work by Theatre Action and Theatre of the Silence at the Fringe Club’s Fringe Studio, the production making use of a mixture of sign and stylized body languages rather than verbal forms of communication. Evening performances commence at 8pm while the Saturday matinees are set for 3pm. Tickets are $120 from HK Ticketing, 31 288 288.

May 16-18
She’ll Be Coming ’Round the Mountain according to the popular American folk song, but for the Youjiang National Song and Dance Troupe of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, it’s more a case of Love Comes Shining Over the Mountains. This month, the award-winning group, entirely comprising representatives from Mainland China’s ethnic minorities, will perform a series of Zhuang, Miao, Yi and Thai dances along with the climactic Splendorous China. The Yuen Long Theatre’s Auditorium will be the venue for the May 16 show, the Sai Wan Ho Civic Centre’s Theatre will host the May 17 presentation and the May 18 performance takes place at the Tai Po Civic Centre’s Auditorium. Showtime is 8pm on all three evenings but ticket prices vary by venue; those for the May 16 show cost $160-$80, for the May 17 show $180-$100 and for the show on May 18, $160 and $100, all from URBTIX, 2734 9009.

May 16-June 15
We Will Rock You! That’s the title – and, it would seem, promise – of the jukebox musical by Ben Elton and Queen band members Brian May and Roger Taylor that will run from May 16 to June 15 at the HK Academy of Performing Arts’ Lyric Theatre. With 26 Queen hits and named after the legendary rock band’s seriously rockin’ anthem, the spectacular show is a futurist adventure set in a time when live music is banned on earth and youth is up in arms against the all-powerful corporation which controls their lives and feeds them a diet of synthesized pop. The Tuesday to Saturday evening performances begin at 8pm, the Saturday matinees at 2pm and the shows on Sunday at 1pm and 7pm. Tickets are $895 to $395 on Friday and Saturday evenings and $795 to $350 on other days as well as for the weekend matinees from HK Ticketing, 31 288 288.

May 17 and 18
Maybe they wish to show how much they value the cultural institutions defined by the International Council of Museums (ICOM) as being “in the service of society and its development”. Whatever the reason, the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) and more than 30 museums and heritage institutions in Beijing, Guangdong Province, Macau and Hong Kong have decided to celebrate International Museum Day over two days rather than one this year! A series of special programmes and activities are planned for May 17 and 18, including a Museum Panorama at the Piazza of the HK Cultural Centre which will be open from 10am to 6pm on both days. For further information and details (including about participating institutions), go to www.lcsd.gov.hk/specials/imd2008/en/index.php

Tuesday, May 20
He may have been a prodigy who started playing the piano at age 3 and won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Music at 11 but Reginald Kenneth Dwight went on to make his name in popular rather than classical music. As Sir Elton John (he was knighted in 1998), he is a megastar and global household name. Sixty years young this year, he is currently roving with the Elton John & Band Rocket Man Tour, the Hong Kong leg of which will take place on Tuesday, May 20, at the AsiaWorld-Arena. Showtime is 8pm.
Tickets are priced from $1,680-$380 from HK Ticketing, 31 288 288.

May 21-25
Bring lots of tissues if you are planning to check out the HK Players’ latest production – American playwright David Lindsay-Abaire’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Rabbit Hole famously inspires copious weeping. William Yip directs and Stephen Bolton is the producer for this local presentation of the searing drama that poignantly examines how a family deals with the accidental killing of a child. It will play at the HK Arts Centre’s McAulay Studio from May 21-25, with performances beginning at 8pm each evening. Tickets are $240 from URBTIX, 2734 9009.

May 22-24
Encouraged by a successful run in November 2007 at the HK Arts Centre’s Shouson Theatre, Lindsey McAlister’s Flesh returns for three days this month at the same 439-seater venue. Saskia, the ‘everywoman’ protagonist of this two-act musical comedy, is the head honcho of a lifestyle guide for women and a fitness guru who doesn’t exactly practice what she preaches. Thus, even while she seeks the road to a fitter, healthier life, she finds temptation in the call of French fries, doughnuts and other fatty foods! The May 22-24 performances begin at 7:45pm. Tickets are $320 and $280 from URBTIX, 2734 9009.

May 22-June 11
A man of many talents (who has tried his hand at painting and directing as well as writing novels, plays and film scripts), Gao Xingjian was born in Ganzhou, China, in 1940, became a citizen of France in 1997 and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2000. Part of Le French May, the Gao Xingjian Arts Festival is a multi-media celebration of Gao’s works running from May 22 to June 11 at various venues, including the Chinese University of HK, the HK Arts Centre and Alisan Fine Arts. Over the same period, Alisan Fine Arts will also hold the New Works by Gao Xingjian 2007-2008 exhibition featuring 25 new ink paintings by the French Chinese émigré. Admission is free to all programmes in this arts festival, bar the May 30 to June 1 performances of world premiering drama Of Mountains and Seas, for which tickets are priced at $280 from HK Ticketing, 31 288 288. For further information (including details about individual programmes), go to www.gxjartsfest2008.com/

Saturday, May 24
The highest of four newly formed tiers of elite competition across all 25 Asian rugby unions, the HSBC Asian Five Nations is played on a five-week, round-robin home-and-away format. On Saturday, May 24, Hong Kong will take on Korea in a match that could determine which of Asia’s current top five teams will drop into Division 1 for 2009 to make way for the 2008 Division I champion. Last year, Hong Kong recorded a famous 27-20 victory over the same opponents in the Asian Nations Series and a repeat result would be just dandy. The kick-off at King’s Park Sports Ground in Ho Man Tin, Kowloon, is at 4pm. Admission is free.