How John Fung found his passion for photography after difficult teenage years in Macau and Hong Kong, and why he always lives in the moment
- Born in Madagascar and raised in Macau, Fung went through a number of odd jobs and even tried modelling, before discovering a passion for photography
- Wanting a break, he opened Black Sheep restaurants in Shek O and Sai Kung, then went back to his first love. His images should always tell a story, he says
In the 1940s, my father left China to find work in Madagascar, East Africa. For some years, he ran a stall in a market. When he was ready to start a family, he wrote to a matchmaker back home, who introduced him to a wife. They married in China and returned to Madagascar together. Although it was arranged, it was a love marriage.
I was the first child, born in 1953, and have three younger siblings. We lived in the capital, Antananarivo. People were not rich, but it was a very peaceful and simple life. As kids we ran around barefoot. We spoke a little French, a few words of Malagasy – it was enough to play with the local kids.
When Madagascar got its independence (from France, in 1960), my father decided it was time to leave. In 1966, we flew to Hong Kong, but immigration wouldn’t let us enter so we went to Macau.
Class struggle
My father moved to Hong Kong to look for work and the rest of the family stayed in Macau. My brother and I went to Yuet Wah College, an all-boys’ Catholic school. It was a hellish adjustment – the education system was so different from what we’d come from in Madagascar and lessons were difficult.
The teacher spoke Cantonese, but I didn’t understand what she was saying as my parents’ dialect, which we’d grown up with, was so different. After a few years, the whole family moved to Hong Kong and lived on Argyle Street, in Mong Kok. In those days it was such a quiet area that I used to sleep with the window open.
Odd jobs
The Hong Kong education system was even more difficult than the one in Macau. I wasn’t doing well at school, so my various uncles suggested work for me. For a few months I packed clothes in a factory, which was very boring.
My father worked as a boat-keeper in a theme park in San Po Kong and he got me a job at a nearby cinema. I was responsible for closing the doors and drawing the curtains at the start of the movie. It was a fun job and I was able to watch the films, but my family didn’t think it was a proper job.
An uncle got me a job selling tickets at a fairground. I’m terrible at counting and often gave back too much change, so I quickly lost that job. Another uncle helped get me a job at a printing company. With one of my first pay cheques I bought a camera – a Voigtländer – which was beautiful, but I didn’t really understand how to use it properly.
The boss at the printing firm tried to train me, and it was a good opportunity, but after a few months I packed the job in unexpectedly. I’m not entirely sure why, but it didn’t feel right. My father was furious and threatened that if I didn’t go back to the job, he’d put an advertisement in the paper renouncing his son.
He was so angry, I understand why he used this kind of fighting language. I cried and ran into my room and packed some clothes and books and picked up my guitar and left home.
Greenhouse effect
There was a lot of suffering in society and I participated in a lot of social services and did a lot of volunteer work. A friend who I met doing voluntary work lived in Kowloon City. There, the houses were quite big, some even had gardens, and in one was a disused glass greenhouse. I was allowed to stay in the greenhouse.
Without any uncles telling me what to do, I felt liberated. It was a new challenge for me: I needed to work out what to do by myself. A friend introduced me to a famous painter, Michael Wong Cheung, who had studied in France and lived near the greenhouse. I started working for him, doing a little cleaning and making him coffee. I learned from him what the idea of art is. I moved from the greenhouse to live in his studio.
I enjoyed the job and learned a lot about art and ways of seeing. I began working as an artist’s model for some of his students. I’d go to his house for breakfast, then start modelling, and I’d be paid immediately after the job. With my first payment I bought a roll of film for my camera.
Street life
My passion for photography was huge. I was never without my camera, it became an extension of my hand. I practised all the time, constantly checking my focus. I supported myself by modelling in the morning and spent the rest of the time taking photos.
There were many homeless people in Hong Kong at the time. I wanted to let more people know about the situation of people who were struggling in society, so they were the focus of my work. In the 1980s, I put together my first collection of photographs, Ten Years On, a set of black-and-white slides.
My girlfriend at the time helped me write a proposal and send the pictures to the British Council. I think they were impressed with my passion for the street people and I won a scholarship to go to London.
I also got a scholarship from the Asian Cultural Council to go to New York for three months. I left in 1988 with the idea of photographing street life in different cities. I also went to Venice and Paris. That year abroad really changed my outlook. In New York, I took a short course in stand-up comedy. That experience changed my photography style, it made me realise I think too much; I realised I needn’t take things so seriously.
The Black Sheep
I returned to Hong Kong in 1989 and stopped doing the modelling work and focused on my photography. Ilford (the British manufacturer of photographic materials) sponsored me – I could use as much art paper as I needed – and let me use their dark room to print my photos. I worked as a documentary photographer for Next Magazine and Ming Pao Weekly magazine until 2004.
When I first saw the site that would become home to M+ there was nothing – it was zero ... The next time I looked at it, it became one. Creativity is the process from zero to one
I became a bit jaded with that kind of life, so I hid myself in a village in Shek O. In 2005, I was invited by Oxfam and Greenpeace Hong Kong as a volunteer photographer to document areas devastated by the 2004 [Indian Ocean] tsunami. I still do voluntary work for non-profit organisations.
With a friend, I set up a restaurant called Black Sheep in Shek O and we opened another in Sai Kung. It had a hippie philosophy – we served very affordable Chilean wine, the idea was love and peace. I ended up falling out with my partner and sold my share.
From zero to one
In 2008, my photography book One Square Foot was published and I worked as a full-time artist. These days I photograph a lot of birds. Before my mother passed away, she said in her next life she wanted to be a bird and enjoy flying everywhere; maybe she is one of my birds. I have never married, but I love my creative life.
When I first saw the site that would become home to M+ there was nothing – it was zero. I was interested in the space and photographed it. The next time I looked at it, it became one. Creativity is the process from zero to one. Everyone has unseen thoughts and these thoughts create the world around them. Existence plus motivation, carried out in the same space, will constitute a new reality.
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Poetry of life
I think I was born to be sentimental, although I don’t like sunsets. For a long period, I was concerned about suffering and it’s something I still think about. People become very materialistic, they worry about money and the future, and miss out on the poetry of life. My photos capture what is in my heart. Whatever the heart sees and feels, it can photograph.
Things are changing all the time. Change is good, but people worry about it and don’t enjoy the present moment. Photography is about living in the moment – you can’t take pictures from yesterday or the future, it’s always in front of you, now. I like to take a photograph of a bird from yesterday and the sky from today and combine it to tell a story.
