I didn’t have a strong idea of what I was going to photograph at first, other than some street. I was staying in the less glitzy but somewhat gentrifying Western District of Hong Kong island that still has plenty of traditional street activity. I also travelled around to less touristed areas as I discovered there was a photography festival on, with exhibition spaces in relatively out of the way places, often in industrial and commercial buildings. I had been taking pictures of some buildings already but then came across a book in an English language bookshop of photos by Michael Wolf (it’s in one of the videos).
I found this work pretty inspirational. He’s most famous for the, like you say, oppressive pics of high density residential buildings, though in fact what I prefer are his pics of informal use of the city by its residents and workers, particularly in the alleyways between buildings. This seems to me to express the resourcefulness of Hong Kong people, or maybe just people, in the face of very tight living conditions, and fairly high levels of inequality. Also, perhaps a kind of laissez-faire attitude to planning and regulation that the current Hong Kong government is trying to eradicate and that has already been largely wiped out in Beijing.
I think these kinds of plain concrete or rough buildings are more representative of where Hong Kong people actually live. The famous shiny skyline is mainly financial, hotel and office space. I don’t particularly find the buildings oppressive. I lived in Hong Kong for a while back in the 90s and stayed in some such old and tiny apartments (though I was still in a very privileged position). There’s quite a lot of public housing in Hong Kong and I think there’s a community feeling despite or because of the density that I hope some of the pictures hint at.
Journalist friends still living in Hong Kong range from relatively sanguine to very negative over what I’ll euphemistically call the changes going on in the city. (FWIW, my view on what’s happening politically there and in China is awful. What they have done to Jimmy Lai, for instance.) I don’t mean to get political but it would remiss to ignore the reality there.
Back to my ramblings about photography, I’ve been trying to think what I should do beyond just trying to take pretty pictures. Looking for a theme (after the fact) in my random snaps was my attempt to think that through.
If you made it this far, thanks!