Upon completing his studies in the Department of Journalism of Hong Kong Baptist University and the Department of Fine Arts of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Jeff Cheng Tsz Fung (b.1994, Hong Kong) has been widely recognised for his work throughout ten years in photojournalism including the award of Picture of the Year at Taiwan Press Photo Contest 2021. 

In addition to documentary photography, he began a creative voyage in various media, from video and performance to sound and installation. The synthesis of experience and close observation during his formative years in photography has lent the artist an intuition to further explore the notion of “Others” by alienating images from the subjects that they capture. Hence, images are no longer substantive products of re-enactment. Rather, images connect or disconnect an “appearance” from its connotations, discourses and reverberations.

“Bilateral Landscapes”

“Bilateral Landscapes” showcases the artist’s shift from conventional photographic practices to two different visual practices. In “Archiving landscapes”, he attempts to capture the abandoned postures of images within archives, emphasizing the materiality inherent in
the images or their products through repetitive intervention and replication. “In Becoming Landscape” brings the focus back to the photographer himself, exploring how his physical body, recorded in specific contexts, distances itself from personal experience and how it is absorbed by the “landscape.”

The artist’s works begin with documentary photography, and it is the deviation from the essential work of documentary photography and its traditional meanings that drives his desire to reinterpret the relationship between the individual and each external object through his artistic practice. Beyond narrative and emotional expression, documentary photography is also a logical paradox that contradicts its definition – whether it be landscapes, objects, or portraits, each operation gradually distances itself from its actual essence. “Documentary” is creation, yet it is far from achieving itself.