Hong Kong International Photo Festival (HKIPF) is returning from 8 November to 8 December 2024, with the flagship exhibition Mega Family: Imagining Home at the Hong Kong Arts Centre. Co-curated by Blues Wong and Carol Chow, the exhibition echoes the Festival’s earlier explorations of the theme of “home” in exhibitions 300 Families in 2013 and 1000 Families in 2016. Sponsored by FUJIFILM HK, Mega Family: Imagining Homeinvites 15 local photographers from different generations to showcase their works about Hong Kong since 2020, reflecting on the redefinition of home and family in the post-pandemic era and serving as a visual documentation of the social changes experienced under the new normality. 

Unlike previous years, which featured satellite exhibitions and collaborations with overseas artists, this year’s HKIPF focuses on local culture through this single thematic exhibition. Mega Family: Imagining Home aims to explore the evolving physical, cultural, and even mental landscapes in post-pandemic Hong Kong, examining how the meaning of “home” and “family” shifts with changes in the environment amidst a dynamic social backdrop.

Venue address: 4-5/F, Pao Galleries, Hong Kong Arts Centre, 2 Harbour Road, Wan Chai

This 2 session workshop will take participants through the fundamentals of presenting their works in an exhibition to create a compelling narrative. Participants will engage in conversations around conceptualising an exhibition, space, layout, materials and programmes. Participants will put these ideas into practice by working on and presenting an exhibition plan for their existing projects.

Rundown

19:00 – 19:30  Participants to work on their assignment / Consultation with facilitator

19:30 – 21:00  Group review & peer feedback

21:00 – 22:00  Moving forward: Engaging the community & Importance of exhibition programmes

22:00 – 22:30  Tidying up

Deposit: HKD 300*

*Please note that this workshop is open to confirmed participants only. Participants who have received email confirmation must settle the participation fee within the deadline. The admin fee charged by Eventbrite shall be borne by participants. Tickets are non-transferable.

*Refundable only upon attendance. The admin fee charged by Eventbrite shall be borne by participants. Absentees are not allowed for any refunds.

Registration link Click here

23.10 - 24.10.2023

19:00 - 22:00 Each day

Venue address: L2-02, JCCAC, 30 Pak Tin Street, Shek Kip Mei, Kowloon

年年有餘 (nián nián yǒu yú) is a greeting originating from southern Taiwan, where families traditionally prepare a special fish dish for the lunar new year's eve dinner. The annual act is a wish for an abundant year ahead — after all, 魚 (fish) and 餘 (surplus) are pronounced the same. The title 年年有魚 speaks to family relationships, and to the artist's understandings of family after becoming a father. At the same time, through the video work, the exhibition also discusses subjects like love, life, and time.

Bio:

Yan-Cheng Chen, a Taiwanese, explores the nature of time. He finds joy engulfing himself in photography, and since becoming a husband and then a father, has embarked on a project discussing family, love, and time. ‘After becoming a father, time is never as before. Maybe it is love, or some other reason I don’t know yet. I began taking these photos to understand.’

Mon to Sun 10:00 – 22:00 (L3 Common Space)
Tue to Sun 14:00 – 20:00 (Floating Projects)

Venue address: JCCAC L3 Common Space & L3-06D Floating Projects, 30 Pak Tin Street, Shek Kip Mei

After death, is all lost, or does love and strength live on?

A photographic series of death, irrelevant to superstition and the disembodied spirit; a dialogue with the living and the deceased, irrelevant to social structure and taboo; a conversation with oneself, irrelevant to others.

The series explores the borders of living and dying, and begins a journey of self-discovery, and grieving, by getting closer to my grandfather’s death.

Fri to Sun 13:00 – 19:00
Mon to Thu by Appointment

Venue address: 10/F, Foo Tak Building, 365-367 Hennessy Road, Wan Chai (Studio Residency Sponsor by Art & Culture Outreach)

วงวาร (Thai title name)

The cycle of birth and death is certain, yet uncertainty in our existence stimulates our search for meaning. Humans assign meaning to everything, from heaven to hell. We weave wishes on an empty floor…

‘วงวาร‘ offers a mystery of life through intricate mythical symbols embodying countless tiny souls, and through tarot. From the largest circle in the universe to the smallest point — the minuscule circle represents the artist’s presence in the past, present, and future — our lives are layered with question, with Atta and desire, and spin in the wheel of life...

Mon to Sun 11:00-19:00

Venue address: Room A, 4/F, SIL 635 A Kung Ngam, Shau Kei Wan

Trăm Năm Hạnh Phúc (Vietnamese title name)

Vân-Nhi Nguyễn takes interest in documentary photography and seeks to bring fresh approaches to the field. Through overlooked places and individuals, she reconstructs collective memories, both personal and societal. Examining the role of memory as a bridge between society's desire to reshape geographies and its rigid history, she questions its nature: is it fact, and when can we believe memory?

Conversations about Vietnam often disregard the country’s complex history and reality and are typically reduced to two war-torn decades or its current manufacturing hub status. To challenge existing perceptions of Vietnamese people, we must be able to see and understand the unruliness of it: there is an excess of memories bestowed physically across the country, some given prominence through statues or architecture, others left to obliteration, and all becoming vessels for memories.

12.10 - 13.11.2023

Venue address: PMQ H506-H507, 35 Aberdeen Street, Central

‘Time heals all wounds’ but what does healing look like for trauma?

As time passes, trauma becomes a memory most try to forget. For some, it stays with them, in their bodies, their minds, and the way they act.

Individuals confront a part of their past as they recreate an old image symbolising that memory through embroidery. With every stitch, they move further away from their trauma, taking time to understand what had happened, its impact and how to march forward while manoeuvring through therapeutic, repetitive, and rhythmic motions of embroidery.

‘as time passes’ showcases attempts to heal by forming new perspectives as they move forward.

Bio

Based in Singapore, Crystal Sim uses imagery and textiles to portray the intangible side of mental health, a practice largely inspired by personal experience and process-led exploration.

A graduate (BFA, Photography and Digital Imaging) of the Nanyang Technological University, School of Art, Design and Media, she has participated in exhibitions and festivals in Singapore, the USA, and Mainland China, and was awarded the 2020 Kwek Leng Joo Prize of Excellence in Photography.

Venue address: 118 Queen’s Road West, Sai Ying Pun

In the midst of our human hustle and bustle, I find solace in nature’s whispers, capturing transcendent moments, revealing the presence and essence of beings thriving even in urban life, and connecting us to something greater. A sunbathing prehistoric creature. Spirals on ancient marble. Each discovery through the lens leads me closer to cosmic enigmas predating humanity. Our region was once known as ‘Baak Jyut’ (Or ‘Baiyue’), and this Chronicle honours these historical roots. It aspires to create a sanctuary for the soul, a refuge far from Hong Kong’s modern constructs, and a livable frequency amidst life’s ceaseless ebb and flow.

Venue address: 2/F, Tak On House, 13 Wong Chuk Street, Sham Shui Po

‘With All Flatness’ is a creation that seeks tranquillity amid chaos, and a way out from these flat surfaces.

By removing the sole narration from the visual documentary, the artist wishes to curate a unique piece of artwork where the audience can link it to their own experiences in life through a series of symbols. After all, all of us can recover from the pain of life, just as the artist wishes to move on from his traumas exposed in news photography.

Mon to Sun 11:00 – 19:00

Venue address: Room A, 4/F, SIL 635 A Kung Ngam, Shau Kei Wan

‘Home (Away From Home)’ offers an insight into the ways in which queer relationships provide a sense of safety, a sense of belonging, and a sense of home.

Comprised of both still and moving imagery, this exhibition tells stories of the sensual and sensuous nature of queer love and queer life, from wavy, hazy disco-dance-floors to soft, gentle embraces of lovers and friends holding hands and holding space for one another. Viewers can experience life in Naarm (Melbourne) through the eyes of the artist and consider how we value intimacy in our everyday lives.

Mon to Sun 11:00 – 21:00

Venue address: 4/F Eaton HK, 380 Nathan Road, Jordan

'When the sun reaches the river,
sometimes it heats it up,
drying out the same river
which floods the villages.
We cannot make the sun shine less,
but we can make it hurt us less.
Why do we not help ourselves?
I met a man, and he said
“We can benefit for a day, but we lose a lifetime to live.”
When the sacred sun reaches the sacred river,
we will know we are not in control.'

This verse urged me to explore the issues surrounding a minority group in Cambodia affected by the Lower Se San Dam II. When their village of Kbal Romeas was flooded and destroyed, some people relocated while others stayed on, residing in the forest and boycotting the dam's electricity. We cannot control the effect of climate change but we can minimise its harm.

Venue address: PMQ H508, 35 Aberdeen Street, Central

This two-part series — ‘Fallen Portraits on the Soil’ and ‘The Rite of Passing By: I didn’t see them but I saw them’ — is set in public housing. The installation portrays the overseen and questions the use of materials and images, and the limitations of photography itself.

In the first set, the viewer gazes into beauty and decay, eternity and ephemerality, of flowers secretly planted by the residents, and of dead insects; The second set draws on a large number of images taken since 2017 of discarded household items. The viewer considers the former use of the objects, and the previous owners.

Mon to Sun 11:00 – 19:00

Venue address: 2/F, Tak On House, 13 Wong Chuk Street, Sham Shui Po

Whether it is a frail tree in its loneliest moment, the inconspicuous view of hands, or a recognisable landmark familiar from pop culture, these scenes come together to form an anecdote of a life in disarray. The same symbols that one has lengthy relationships with can be coupled with the difficulty in attaching to a place or time — a fundamental ability to communicate is severed, and intimacy that one yearns for, seized.

Showing settings from Hong Kong and Japan, this series is part of the artist’s journey to resolve an identity. The local is the foreign, the insider is the outsider. Along with the visible, ponder the absent.

Mon to Sun 10:00 – 22:00

Venue address: JCCAC L7 Green Space, 30 Pak Tin Street, Shek Kip Mei

In the 1950s, the British Hong Kong Government installed public phone booths across Hong Kong.

We selected one of these now disused booths, about one square metre in size, wrapped it in a reflective cover, and drilled a hole into a coin from the colonial era, making a pinhole darkroom. Through inverted images, the viewer shuttles back and forth between landmarks before and after the handover, tracing the shifting political relationship between ‘deconstruction’ and ‘construction’.

A discarded phone booth, waiting to be dismantled, a memento of the Queen still being circulated today.

Gallery address: 14/F, Hong Kong Arts Centre, 2 Harbour Road, Wan Chai

Born in 1933, Yu Pak Lin started working for Cathay Advertising and McCann-Erickson in the 1960s. Around the same time, he bought his first camera and has never stopped photographing. Photography has since been his favourite medium to record the world around him. He is still constantly snapping away with his mobile phone today. His relentlessness of visually recording his life has resulted in a large collection of photographic materials. Looking through them, his son Yu Ka Ho was struck by the number of images depicting sites of demolition and construction. In this project, Ka Ho dived into this vast archive in an attempt to discover hidden narratives about the ever-changing landscape of Hong Kong, and responded with his own works.

Satellite exhibition of HKIPF

Gallery address: G/F, 23 New Market St, Sheung Wan

This is not a film stills exhibition, at least not in the usual sense.

‘Off-sets: Photographies of Hong Kong Cinema’ brings together 12 image makers, many of whom have contributed to shaping the Hong Kong cinescape through their multiple roles as directors, art directors, cinematographers, production and stills photographers, costume and set designers, and journalists. Their expansive use of photography results in a broad range of visual constructions that reflect varying means and intentions. As a vessel of popular culture and collective expression, a film can carry the consciousness of a society and its makers at a particular point of time. From behind-the-scenes preparation to on-set performance, filming and production, image makers assume, whether consciously or subconsciously, the role of a ‘medium’ or ‘mediator’ — capturing images, messages, or thoughts, and conveying them to the audience.

Christopher Doyle, Fong Ho Yuen, Sharon Salad, Lo Yuk Ying, Man Lim Chung, Okazaki Hirotake, Wing Shya, Karen Cloudy Tang, Jupiter Wong, Louie Wong, Justine Yeung, Tim Yip

JCCAC L0 & L1 Galleries, Common Spaces and Blue Walls

Venue address: Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre, 30 Pak Tin Street, Shek Kip Mei, Kln

Let us take you on a trip back to 1980s Hong Kong to relive that intoxicating time when the city seemed full of promise and infinite possibilities. Our journey begins in Canada with a young Greg Girard, then only 18, who was so deeply struck by Eliot Elisofon’s 1962 photograph of the Hong Kong harbour, that he made it his life's mission to get here and see it for himself. He arrived by boat in 1974 and in 1982 decided to settle down in this bustling city. Drawn by Hong Kong's dynamic blend of east and west, Girard spent the 80s roaming through all its many nooks and crannies, capturing Hong Kong as he saw it, raw and very much alive. The period of time helped Girard defend his photography path and became a well-respected artist himself. Blue Lotus Gallery proudly presents HK UNSEEN, photographs by iconic artist that have never been published or exhibited before. 

HK UNSEEN is part of HKIPF Satellite Exhibition 2021 as a collaborator.

Related events:
Zoom Artist Talk with Greg Girard
Saturday 27 November 2021, 11am: Meet at the gallery or log in online

Gallery address: 28 Pound Lane, Tai Ping Shan

In Till Love Do Us Apart, Liao Jiaming used images of human body and cityscape to create photo installations, questioning the social norms that hold the rein to our understanding of ideal lovers, and seeking liberation from such formula from the perspective of queer identity.

Performance by Liao Jiaming
30 October 2021, 5pm at 7/F JCCAC*

“Repetition maximum” (RM) is a concept in weight training, referring to the most weight you can lift for a defined number of exercise movements. The performance is a voyage through time and space. Led by the artist and different media, surveying the bodies of our own and others, we re-evaluate the weight of our torsos in the society of the spectacle filled with digital images.

* For those who wish to participate in the entire performance, please note that the artist will depart from JCCAC at some point then take viewers all the way to RNH Space, where the finale of the performance will take place. Register for event.

Reality Overdose, curated by Yang Jiang, is part of Satellite Exhibitions by Hong Kong International Photo Festival 2021.

Venue address: from L7 Green Space, JCCAC (30 Pak Tin St, Shek Kip Mei) to RNH Space (Rm 2313, Khora,128 Bedford Rd, Tai Kok Tsui)

Mark your calendars! HKIPF is back next month from 15 Oct! Presenting 49 works from Taiwan, South and Southeast Asia on big screens. And of course, there will be a fresh edition of Satellite Exhibitions with local image makers and Venue Partners.

Look out for a series of maker/curator talks, audio-guided district tours, photo walks, workshops, performances… Big thanks to all image makers, partners and friends who’ve been working on this with and to those who’ve been keeping an eye out for this year’s Festival.
The line-up and events will be announced later, so go check HKIPF social medias for Festival updates, artist features, registration arrangements and more from now all through til 28 Nov.