BY SHEUNG YIU
When it comes to the question ‘which photographer is worth watching’, who else is better to answer than the practitioners themselves. ‘Photographers Tag Photographers’ (PTP in short) is an interview series that does exactly that. We talked to photographers, about their projects, about their journey and about inspirational photographers. To open the series, I talked to one of the most prolific Hong Kong artist, Leung Chi Wo (梁志和). Leung incorporates photography, sculpture and installation into his art. His work discusses our relationship with almost everything, our relationship with culture, our connection with media, our experience with images.
© Leung Chi Wo + Sara Wong, Office Lady With A Red Umbrella. Chromogenic print, 100x150cm, 2010
© Leung Chi Wo, Postcard of 1950’s Queen’s Road Central, printed circa 1980. Found object, 10.5x15cm, 2010
1. Growing up, have you ever imagined being a photographic artist
Not really. I didn’t think about being an artist even after I graduated from art schools.
2. What is your first camera? What is your first memory with photography?
Nikon FM2. I only remember there was an old Agfa medium format camera at home but it was only used by my father or brother.
3. When did you start to see photography as an art form/ a way of expression?
In my second year in college, I borrowed my brother’s SLR camera and spent the whole summer in the US travelling. I killed so much film. It was kind of like a combination of tourist experience plus art student’s projection of art. I didn’t learn photography in my college years at all. ‘Photography is art’ has never been controversial in my development. I remember even when I was in art school where photography was not taught. I consciously added photographs into my works, perhaps I was just being rebellious.
4. Is your art school training important to your photography?
I considered my undergraduate years a general education and I enjoyed a lot of exposure to social science too. I think it’s important to have it as a foundation to acquire further knowledge. My study in a photography short course in Italy and museum internship in Belgium in my postgraduate years was important for it prompted me to consider to practise art seriously. Of course, my MFA study was a stage that I transited to be a practising artist. Photography for me is not only a technique, tool or medium but a subject to think about, sometimes I take it as a metaphor. Sometimes I made work about photography that is not photographic.
5. What are you working on now?
I am working on my first survey show in OCAT Shenzhen in April, 2015. It is an installation/investigation about my first experience in Shenzhen when I was 5 in 1973 in addition to a selection of existing works. I am also collaborating with Sara Wong for our exhibition in Blindspot in March, 2015. We have worked on our last two projects, He was lost yesterday and we found him today, and we have done so much writing for our object installation Museum of the Lost. He was lost is a self-portrait series, referencing unidentified individuals and Museum is a collection of objects in which we found those unidentified people and we try to give them certain identity for sure in failure.
6. How is your research process?
Looking for links, between me and other things, in particular seemingly unrelated things. Lots of desktop research but sometimes working in libraries and archives.
© Leung Chi Wo + Sara Wong, Young Girl In Blue Jumping Up, 100x150cm, 2014
7. Photographers are unique visual artists in a sense that they put reality in new contexts, in front of new viewers of completely different cultural backgrounds. What do you want to achieve in your project ‘He was lost yesterday and we found him today’?
It is a performative project. The artists performed to mend the holes in the grand narrative of history (in our own words). It was a process to extend a split second into hours (of our studio shooting). It was a ritual to imagine being lost in the history but at the same time to immerse in the paradox that the artist is always known in the art production.
For the viewers, I hope they can examine the experience of viewing a photograph through the re-enactment of gaze. We always look for found images that we understand a little but are confused at last. Certain mystery, but something we thought we could explain (and we failed of course). Just like we come across thousands images every day but only manage to remember few, and among them some for no reasons! So, maybe we want the audience to experience our viewing experience, something more perceptual, less reasoning. That’s why we isolate the context against a colour backdrop. (Politically speaking, if the grand narrative of history is about reasoning, this project is about unreasoning.)
8. What is the story behind the idea of the project? Was it an ongoing conversation between you and Sara?
We first did a public art commission with the similar idea and were really excited to continue. Back in 2010, we collaborated on a project titled ‘She was lost in the past and we found her today’ for the Tamagawa Art Line Project curated by Toshio Shimzu.
During our research trip in Ota, we found a recent publication of photos of Ota in the 1950s. Although the city and the architecture have changed a lot, a few of images around the train station were still recognizable. We picked one which was taken right outside the station 50 some years ago. The woman who looked back in the foreground captured our attention immediately. Contemplating this void of identity, we decided to stage ourselves (in this case Sara Wong) to link up the site and the photographic representation with the time and the unidentified person, in the hope that our own being could fill up this void left by the history.
9. Your work often present photography in unconventional formats. Why?
I guess first I was not a trained photographer and was very ignorant about formats in the beginning. As a visual artists, I made work out of the contexts and tasks in my research. I would acquire new techniques and skills for some projects. Format is a narrative element for my visual expression. A large photo would allow life scale experience.
10. Are there any mentors/ photographers/ young photographers/ artists that you draw inspiration from?
Paolo Gioli, Walker Evans, Eugene Atget, Tomoko Yoneda… not sure if my work is inspired by them but for sure I like their works very much.
11. How does Hong Kong inspire you artistically? Living in a city with such dense visual elements, does it influence your aesthetic and artistic thinking?
The history and the place are things that one need to explore by oneself. However, I don’t think I got much visuals from HK. Sometimes I find them annoying. I like to think about relationships and reasons.
12. Any great exhibition that you recommend?
Jeff Wall at Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam . Ching Chin Wai at Exit Gallery, Hong Kong
13. Every interview, we ask photographer to tag another photographer who creates significant work to the contemporary photography scene in Hong Kong. Who is your choice?
Ng Sai Kit