M+ Rover was a travelling creative studio and exhibition space that toured local schools and community spaces. For the 2020–21 edition, we collaborated with Hong Kong artist Wong Ting Yan to develop a series of creative videos for teachers, students, and the public, based on his commissioned work Yes but Why? .

Teachers can watch the videos with their students during a lesson or ask students to watch them at home. We encourage teachers to also download the M+ Rover Teacher’s Resource Pack to organise extended classroom activities for students to gain a deeper understanding of the artist and his practice.

Playing the role of the storyteller, artist Wong Tin Yan shares a story about learning and takes us into a fascinating world. It is a story about a quiz, in which students respond to a whimsical multiple-choice question. Everybody has an unusual and inventive idea—what is right, and what is wrong? Can we always find the answers in textbooks? Wong Tin Yan invites us to join him on a search for fresh and original perspectives.

Continuing in the questioning spirit of the ‘Yes but Why?’ Quiz Show, artist Wong Tin Yan invites four primary school students to visit the ‘Yes but Why?’ restaurant for an unusual dining experience. With hidden cameras set up around the room, the students share their thoughts and doubts about the strange foods and eating utensils on the table, while the artist prompts them to ponder questions such as, ‘To eat, or not to eat?’ and ‘How to eat?’ Making an analogy between ‘eating’ and ‘learning’, the artist encourages viewers to rethink their habits and look for surprising ingredients in everyday life, so that they can cook up a delicious learning experience for themselves.

‘From a pair of tongs to a hand-clapping tool and from electrical drill to musical instrument and––do objects only have one function?’

During the pandemic, Wong Tin Yan has been posing a series of questions to himself that reflect on the relevance of art to life. ‘Why do we need art? What is its function?’ He responds to these questions by creating works with his own hands. In showing these works in videos, Wong encourages teachers, students, and the public to take pictures of their creative thoughts about alternative uses of objects in their houses.