Leung Chi Wo and Wong Sara

Photojournalist With Two Cameras

Photojournalist with Two Cameras by Leung Chi Wo and Sara Wong restages a portrait of a photojournalist from the background of an old photograph of protest published in South China Morning Post on January 10, 2010, under the headline “Return of the Radicals: Recent angry protests are nothing new.” The photojournalist in the photograph, probably from a protest of earlier decades, was capturing the scene of a protester’s arrest while wearing two cameras. January of 2010 was a time of pro-Democracy demonstrators called for the release of activist Liu Xiaobo, drafter of the Charter 08 manifesto calling for the end of authoritarian rule, who was sentenced to 11 years in prison one month earlier. Leung Chi Wo’s isolating and highlighting of the photographer by bringing him from the original photograph’s background to the foreground of his studio shot calls attention to the two older cameras and the journalist’s retro-style clothing. This focus brings forth the multiplicity of gazes present in photojournalism and its implications for free speech and freedom of the press across the geopolitical history of Hong Kong.