Gerard was commissioned to come to Hong Kong by the Mandarin Hotel, in 1963, to execute one large fresco in the main lobby and fourteen large murals throughout the hotel, some which are featured below…

“The Mandarin is a veritable museum, a palace of the arts, thanks to the genius of Gerard D’A. Henderson.”

Margit Varga

The murals throughout Hong Kong’s Mandarin Hotel, are painted on backgrounds of golden browns and ochres, with faint patches of turquoise and sometimes a tint of vermillion, greens and tawny yellows. Some spaces within the contours are left untouched to let the background come through, uniting surface and textural effects so subtle as to be almost invisible to the unsophisticated eye. Over all this a patina of subdued tints ties the whole mural together, imparting a warm luminous glow, a discreet harmony of subdued and vibrant earthy tints: all spontaneous – yet all very much under the muralist’s control.

Some of his best scenes represent conventional oriental subjects: noblemen traveling on horseback, Mongolian warriors, ceremonial feasts showing the great Khan dining with two of his generals. White groups of maidens and musicians hover. High speed chariots with noblemen travelling, seeming to move and transmitting their spirit of genuine Han art!

In all, Henderson captures the secret inner glow of the Orient…his recreated scenes of Kublai Khan blends the grandeur of the dynasties with the fullest blaze of Mongol ferocity!

Mounted Mongol warriors escorting a Chinese princess on horseback. Scenes of riders and grooms in a Mongol encampment, of officials receiving tributes from foreign emmisaries.