Hong Kong museums take tours for disabled people to the next level

Stella Lee Yuen-wa, a Hong Kong Sign Language (HKSL) teacher who is deaf, is passionate about art and enjoys going on guided tours of museums and art galleries. But a big problem she encounters is a paucity of non-audio explanations.

“Even when I went to museums in Australia and Japan, there would be tours but I couldn’t hear them. Without comprehension, I had no choice but to leave [them] after a short while.”

In Hong Kong, specialists at museums and public galleries are constantly designing new ways to engage with members of the public, such as through multilingual tours and multimedia experiences that help people better understand the objects on show.

But far too often, tours aimed at the disabled community are limited to solving mobility issues, such as providing barrier-free access to exhibition halls.

Things are beginning to change.