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7 questions with Scotty So

1. When did you first come to Hong Kong, and why have you stayed? What were your thoughts on the city?

I was actually born here in the East Kowloon side on 14 February, 1995 and I grew up there so I guess I was too young to decide where to stay and go. I haven't had a lot of memories when I was 0-2 years old but one of my oldest memories was to go to my dad's company which was in the factory area in Kwun Tong. It was by the sea and the sky was grey all the time and there were lots of rust on the factory buildings. I remembered that I liked this city a lot, because everywhere I went, it was always new to me. Another oldest memories I have is that my Grandfather took my all the way to Central and I saw all the tall huge giant buildings around me and that was the time I felt how small I was and I was part of the city.

2. What initially got you interested in photography? What made you decide to focus on the subjects that you photograph? Is there a theme/a personal interest/inspiration in movement, in the arts e.g. light and space movement? What inspired you? Why do you love it so?

My dad got me my first and the only DSLR when I was in F.3 in high school, but until F.6 I started using it seriously as part of my art project. I was doing a project about geometries and how I found that all human made objects are geometries and so I was wondering was I was created then and using the camera to take pictures of myself to see myself on the image. I wasn't much a person who looked at the mirror when I was in high school cause I was really insecure but after that project, I get to see myself more and so I started using myself as the subject on photography and to explore the person and the identities I am. I loved fashion and costumes since I was young, because it is part of the story telling and that it can reflect the person's identity too. So in my portrait photography fashion and costumes are always huge elements in it. For landscape photography I especially love the repetitive buildings and contraction site of Hong Kong and the contrast of it with the nature, like the sky, and trees in the city. Sometimes I reflect the images with mirror effects to get a bigger space or dimension, as if I could see the space beyond just the buildings cause my whole life has been trapped here.

3. What question do you get asked the most in relation to your work? Are there any cliché questions that people like to ask? I often get asked, "Is it xx?". I think it is because that I always put a lot of illusions into the photography I do, for example the B&W to colored pictures, two of me interacting in 1 picture, or like pictures of my feet that looks like a desert. 4. What does the title of the exhibition mean to you? How does it best speak to you? The first time I looked at HK:ID | identity and illusion, I was actually thinking about my Hong Kong Identity Card. And for identity cards, I have the Hong Kong citizen one, the China traveling card, 3 student cards. And I realized how identity can be so obvious and literal but sometimes it can also be very blurry like our secrets, imaginations, orientations. 5. Do you have a tip for someone visiting a photographic exhibition for the first time? Is there anything they “should” or “shouldn't” do? DON'T TOUCH unless you were asked to. Or if you paid of course then you can do anything. And YES for looking very close to the details and also looking at it in a very far distance and even different angles, you may found something fun. 6. What do you like to do in your downtime, when you’re not working?

I am still a university art student so when I am not studying nor working as an artist with paintings or photography I really enjoy playing video games. They are like different story books but you get to interact with the book and to explore the world of it. But of course reading a book is good too for an imagination adventure. 7. Lastly, name your favourite place to grab a bite to eat/drink in Hong Kong? I LOVE the Kowloon Bay Mega Box IKEA restaurant. They have an outdoor balcony where you can sit down to enjoy the traditional Scandinavian food with the whole harbour view of Hong Kong Island. I go there sometimes with my friends in business attire and flowers, table paper, electronic candles and a few bottle of wine.

#HKID HKIDme IdentityandIllusion LIGHTSTAGEhk steponSTAGE artonSTAGE ArtBaselHK ArtWeek2016

7 questions with Christopher Button

1. When did you first come to Hong Kong, and why have you stayed? What were your thoughts on the city?

I moved to Hong Kong four and a half years ago, initially only for a year. But this town is quite addictive! I came straight after finishing my master's in documentary film making, and wanted to live and work somewhere new. After watching Wong Kar Wai's 'In the Mood for Love' I was intrigued by Hong Kong, and I'm still very much enchanted by this wonderful city. I'm very proud to call it my home.

I only started taking photos seriously about three years ago. My background is in filmmaking. I cant remember the exact moment or even reasons why I moved over to still photography but I'm completely obsessed now. I love the immediacy of it, not really having to plan too much. I can just pick up my camera, walk outside and make art. Having said this, much of my inspiration still comes from cinema and cinematography, specifically the films of Kubrick, Wong Kar Wai and Tarkovsky, as well as the photographs of Saul Leiter and William Eggleston. 3. What question do you get asked the most in relation to your work? Are there any cliché questions that people like to ask? I often get asked for the 'meaning' in my photographs, “what does this picture mean?” To be honest I'm always slightly hesitant to answer these kinds of questions. Firstly, because I think any sort of explanation on this level can disrupt the individual's viewing of the work. It taints it in some way. And secondly (and quite possibly more honestly) sometimes I'm not sure myself what the photo's 'meaning' is. Sometimes it's a mystery to me too, but I find some comfort in that. 4. What does the title of the exhibition mean to you? How does it best speak to you? When I initially saw the title HK:ID it instantly resonated with me. I guess photography is how I identify myself. It's the way I see the world and the way I intend myself upon it. And Hong Kong is my world at this point in my life. 5. Do you have a tip for someone visiting a photographic exhibition for the first time? Is there anything they “should” or “shouldn't” do? No, I don't think there are any rules really. Just have fun and make sure you enjoy the free refreshments! 6. What do you like to do in your downtime, when you’re not working? I don't really have too much downtime at the moment. I'm also a full time English teacher and do some commercial photography on the side too. I'm a busy bee! But also love to paint, cook and play football when I get the chance. 7. Lastly, name your favourite place to grab a bite to eat/drink in Hong Kong? My favourite spot is a simple little British pub in soho called the Cutty Sark. I guess it reminds me of home.

#HKID HKIDme LIGHTSTAGEhk steponSTAGE artonSTAGE ArtBaselHK ArtWeek2016

7 questions with Margot Errante

1. When did you first come to Hong Kong, and why have you stayed? What were your thoughts on the city?

I came to China 20 years ago, for a summer course at BLCU in Beijing, and I have ended up living here half my life. Back in the 90s, for a laowai living in Mainland China, Hong Kong was like Blade Runner - the city of a retrofitted future! It was the place where you could buy imported western food, where you could speak English and breathe the air of distant Europe. It was the emergency exit you’d want to run to on those days when you felt homesick. I’ve always been a metropolitan girl, and I loved Hong Kong at first sight. In 2010 I eventually moved here and opened my photographic studio. It is a vibrant challenging city that never seems to sleep. But for people equipped with anti-stress hormones and an inexhaustible source of energy, it is a very good place to be. 2. What initially got you interested in photography? What made you decide to focus on the subjects that you photograph? Is there a theme/a personal interest/inspiration in movement, in the arts e.g. light and space movement? What inspired you? Why do you love it so? I have always been an early morning person, since I was a child. I would wake up at 5am, even on Sundays, and I would get bored while waiting for everyone else to get up. Then one day a close family friend offered me a small point-and-shoot camera. I was eight years old. We started to meet up every Sunday at 6am to go for a walk along the lake (Como, Italy) and take photos. It became a ritual that we continued for ten years. He had a very nice SLR camera, that I was allowed to use as I grew older, until eventually I bought one for myself. Photography has always been such an intrinsic part of my life that it never occurred to me to become a full-time professional. Not until I was thirty-five years old and had already worked as a baby-sitter, waitress, cook, anthropologist, ethno-linguist, teacher, interpreter, cultural mediator, author of language text books, TV reporter, photo journalist, and so on. It took me a very long time to realize that photography is what I really wanted to do in life, exclusively. However, I believe that multi-disciplinarity is crucial in today’s world - therefore I am happy about my detour. In terms of style and content, photographs are my biography: I started out as a travel photographer during my globetrotter years; then I moved to architecture photography during my misanthropic years; and now my interest is human beings and their psychological (r)evolutions, therefore I work mostly as a portrait photographer. Italian painter Caravaggio’s chiaroscuro has been a great source of inspiration. I admire his tenebrism, his dramatic use of light and shadow, bold and indecourus. I like to tease out images from the dark and use as little light as possible. Some people are afraid of their own shadow, but it is in the shadow that it all begins. 3. What question do you get asked the most in relation to your work? Are there any cliché questions that people like to ask? The cliché question is: “What camera do you use?”- as if that was important. I heard this story of a photographer who went to a socialite party and as he entered the front door, the host said: "I love your pictures, they're wonderful, you must have a fantastic camera!". He said nothing until after dinner, then he said: "That was a wonderful dinner, you must have a terrific stove!" I am not a gear geek. I am more into the act of “writing” than into the “pen”. When I get asked: “How did you shoot this?” – then I get excited, as I like to explain my work. 4. What does the title of the exhibition mean to you? How does it best speak to you? As a portrait photographer, I think about identity all the time. People always want to be portrayed in a certain way, but identity is an illusion, is a subjective experience of the mind that is generated by the brain. We experience our self both as an object of awareness and as the subject of awareness. William James called these two forms the ‘Me’, the self as known (self-as-object) and the ‘I’, the self as knower (self-as-subject). The I is the self that is ‘conscious awareness’ in the present moment and the Me is what the self remembers from the past, represents in the present moment and projects into the future. When I remember myself from the outside taking a photograph along the lake when I was ten, the remembered self I see from the third person perspective is an example of the self-as-object, while the self-as-subject consists in my being aware of myself now remembering this event. Most of us would recognize “me” as our personal identity. “Me” is who we think we are. However, both the “I” and the “me” are ever-changing narratives generated by our brain to provide a coherent framework that organizes the output of all the factors that contribute to our thoughts and behaviour. And it is from this idea of an ever-changing narrative of the self that my series “Peeling Bark” of The Human Condition collection was born. We change perpetually and we have many inner layers, just like shedding trees. Sometimes shedding is a normal process, other times injury or disease is causing it. If you see bark covering the wood after the old bark peels away, the tree is probably undergoing a normal shedding. If you see bare wood or mats of fungus under the peeling bark, the tree is suffering from environmental damage or disease. So are human beings. We are born in societies where were are taught since a young age to define ourselves and to choose a box where to fit in for life. But it is impossible, we are shedding trees: we change all the time. 5. Do you have a tip for someone visiting a photographic exhibition for the first time? Is there anything they “should” or “shouldn't” do? Arguing what someone should or should not do involves appealing to a standard, and proving our claims in terms of that standard. But photography, like any other art form, should take you one step further into the realm of unique personal experience where there are no standards, and there are no rules. What you experience depends on your sensitivity. The only tip that I could probably share is: try to see what you’re looking at, rather than over-looking it. Be present. 6. What do you like to do in your downtime, when you're not working? Photography is hard work, therefore I work most of the time: when I’m not shooting, I study and I do research. Nevertheless, everyday I try to find some time to play, draw and read with my three-year old son. Being with him is indeed what I love the most. 7. Lastly, name your favourite place to grab a bite to eat/drink in Hong Kong? Ping Pong! I love the high ceiling, the food, the music, and how they make Negroni.

Peeling Bark Woman No. 4, Human Nature, 2015, Limited Edition Archival Giclée Print, 50 x 70 cm @ 2015 by Margot Errante

http://www.margotpoloproduction.com/

#HKID HKIDme IdentityandIllusion LIGHTSTAGEhk artonSTAGE steponSTAGE ArtBaselHK ArtWeek2016

7 questions with Austin Irving

Our upcoming exhibition ‘HK:ID identity and illusion’, a photo and interactive performance art exhibition, begins Sunday 20th March with our VIP Opening. It will be open to the public from Monday 21st March, and we hope to see a lot of familiar faces! In the run up to next week, LIGHTSTAGE wanted to catch up with one of our featured photographers, Austin Irving. Read on to hear about what has inspired her journey thus far, and what the HK:ID exhibition means to her..

1. When did you first come to Hong Kong, and why have you returned? What were your thoughts on the city?

I visited Hong Kong for the first time in early 2011 and instantly fell in love. I came again for six week last fall and as soon as I got back to the states, I started to plan my return trip - I can't get enough! I am a born and raised New Yorker who has lived in Los Angeles for the past 5 or so years, to me Hong Kong is weirdly the best of what I love about both cities - the hustle and energy of NYC and the nature and places of extreme solitude of LA. 2. What initially piqued your interest in Photography? Why did you decide to focus on the specific things that you photograph? I got my first camera when I was 8 years old - a hot pink Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle camera that I adored and was hooked on photography ever since. In high school, I was the lab technician in the black and while darkrooms of my high school and I knew very early on that I wanted to study photography in college. As my work has evolved over the years themes of universally, locationless and the anthropocentrism have emerged. I delight in the fact that unremarkable locations pop out at me and that I seem to find these spaces that happen to display the special qualities that fit my unique criteria for this project: functionality, serendipity of color and materials, and a lack of cultural signifiers. For example, if everything aligns for me, a hallway in Shenzhen could be a hallway in Arizona, a door in Hong Kong could be a door in Virginia. I feel that I have developed a unique aptitude in discovering and capturing these locations all over the world. I often wonder if they find me. I've been deeply impacted by the work of Hilla and Bernd Becher and their student Thomas Demand. Other artist's work that I admire are Joel Sternfeld, Sandy Skoglund, and Catherine Opie. 3. What is a question that you get asked the most, in relation to your work? Are there any cliché questions that people like to ask? I am often asked how I am able to get so much detail in my photographs which is a welcomed question because I love speaking about the process of large format photography! Shooting on 4x5 color negative is a wonderful process and it's something that I feel grateful is a part of my practice. 4. What does the title of the exhibition mean to you? The work that is on view at LIGHTSTAGE is from a series entitled NOT AN EXIT which is all about optical illusions and a lack of identity. NOT AN EXIT proposes a closer examination of the everyday locations that we routinely pass through; the subjects of the series are doorways and hallways, liminal spaces intended for movement that somehow appear impenetrable. Maze-like optical illusions occur when the linear elements align to simultaneously flatten and expand the two dimensional plane. Void of cultural signifiers, belonging to no specific place or location, a universality of line and form reoccurs from image to image, offering a deeper assessment of the formal elements that make up the spaces we pass through and sometimes never truly see. We are going somewhere and yet—there seems to be no way out. 5. Can you share a tip for someone going to a photography exhibition for the first time? Is there anything they ‘should’ or ‘shouldn't’ do? I truly believe that art is a universal language and everyone is entitled to their own unique, visceral experiences - no matter if they have been to one art show or a thousand. I think the best thing for a first time gallery goer would be to pay close attention to how a piece makes them feel and why - they might be surprised by what bubbles up. We live in an image-saturated word where it’s not only accepted but encouraged to metabolize photographs with exponential speed. It is my goal as a contemporary visual artist to present work that elicits an emotional reaction from my viewers - to create images that have both emotional and visual stamina.

6. What do you like to do in your downtime when you're not working? I love to do so many things! Go on adventures, the movies, hang out with my dog (her name is Kodak), spend time with my friends and family, hiking, listening to music, go on long walks through neighborhoods, thrift store shopping, write electronic music on my computer and then use the tracks to score weird music videos! 7. Lastly, name your favourite place to grab a bite to eat/ drink in Hong Kong? I've been loving Mrs. Pound! But a friend took me to this incredible South African restaurant on Lantau when I was here last fall called The Stoep - I've been dreaming about it ever since!

www.austinirving.com www.wildingcran.com

::A JULY OVERVIEW::

As summer’s now in full swing and we have cruised into August, shall we take a little rewind to look at some of the events we have held at LIGHSTAGE in the past weeks?

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Alaia Paris transformed LIGHTSTAGE for their newest fragrance Azzedine ’s press day launch. Only described as “cold water falling on hot chalk”, Marie Salamagne, the perfumer behind Azzedine, explained their vision for Azzedine. “The idea was not to be able to tell a "story" through fragrance, just to capture something of Alaia's vision." If there was an inspiration of any sort, it was "his [Alaia’s] childhood memory of putting cold water onto a very hot wall; the humidity, and the balance of cool and warm notes." (via Vogue Magazine)

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