1950's Hong Kong Photos (Fan Ho)

[darya151]

The light- beautiful!

 

[peterm1]

Thank you for this, I love Hong Kong for photography. It really does offer some terrific image making opportunities and is such a vibrant and exciting place.

The following link is to a set of HK videos made by a Dutch gentleman by the name of Michael Rogge who, as a young man went there to work in Hong Kong the early 1950s.

He also has some videos made on trips to other Asian countries including Japan in this era and he has since posted other videos made at various times in various countries. I stumbled upon it some time ago and kept the link as it is so interesting. Check out the collection here.

https://www.youtube.com/user/MichaelRogge

And if anyone is interested or has doubts about the growth of HK in the past 50 years or so, here are some of my photos taken in 2010 and 2012 during trips I made there on holidays. (I noticed there is some kind of weird corruption of at least one of the following links which seems to be due to the RF server. They may both work but only one worked properly for me.)

https://www.flickr.com/photos/life_in_shadows/sets/72157625302258709/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/life_in_shadows/sets/72157631879282028/

 

[Bingley]

Stunning photos! Thank you for the link.

 

[angelopartemi]

Tremendous work! I love this guy!

 

[stitchohana]

thanks for sharing.

it's good to see old photos of HK, a time where it isn't that crowded ~

 

[analogish]

Lovely pictures. Thank you.

 

[daveleo]

Thank you John for posting this.
Beautiful, inspiring, humbling work !

 

[SuperUJ]

Fan Ho is one of my favorites. Thanks, John for posting! His photographs brought back a lot of memories of how Hong Kong was like to me, although they were taken a little before my time.

John

 

[Out to Lunch]

From the South East Asian region equally interesting and 'unknown' is Le Anh Tai, a photographer from Southern Vietnam. In his "The Poet With A Camera" you'll find some 200 black and white prints. All of these were taken in the 50's and 60's. Unfortunately there is little to find on the web and the book is not for sale on amazon.com. The good news, you'll find it for USD 45 here: http://www.vietnamartbooks.com/shop/details.html?id=321 The link shows four of his photos. PS. I am not associated with this business and have not used the site myself but bought my copy of the book in an art gallery in Saigon, instead.

 

[oftheherd]

Outstanding ! A true mastering of the light.
Thank you for posting.

So true! That was what fascinated me most. His prints are great.

 

[jsrockit]

Fan Ho is one of my favorites.

John, now I know why... I'm happy to have learned of his work.

 

[Tin]

From a different source---similar photos, but with background music:

http://www.ba-bamail.com/Content.aspx?emailid=11856&memberid=813525

 

[nlubis]

Thanks for sharing.
Lovely work.

 

[KM-25]

I have loved Fan Ho’s work since getting a copy of “Hong Kong Yesterday” from Modern Book in 2007. His foray into the way light defines the stage of his images really puts a lot of street photography to shame. He’s a simple shooter too, this interview gives insight into that part of him.

I caved today and bought "The Living Theatre", Truly inspirational work by Mr. Ho....