The Border Between Past and Present: Wong Chung Wai on Capturing a Family’s Journey
(This is the story behind the photograph—a glimpse into the moment, the process, and the vision that brought it to life.)
A single photograph can bring the past into the present—when framed with intention, it becomes a story.
Wong Chung Wai set out to find the exact place where his parents crossed the China-Hong Kong border four decades ago. For him, photography wasn’t just about capturing an image—it was a way to connect with history. That moment, frozen in a frame, became a piece of his family’s journey.
Borders change, but memories stay.
Walking along the same coastline his parents once swam across, Wong saw the contrast between past and present. Where there were once dark villages, there were now skyscrapers. Where there was once silence, there was now the hum of a city. His camera was searching for what was left of a story.
Some photographs capture a moment, others tell a story—this one did both.
The China-Hong Kong border is a place of contrasts—once a silent marker of division, now a landscape where past and present collide. For Wong Chung Wai, this strip of land held personal significance. It was the place where his parents, four decades earlier, had swum to a new life. As part of his project Hong Kong After Hong Kong, he set out to find that exact location, tracing the journey that had defined his family’s history.
“I walked along the border for hours,” Wong recalls. “The China-Hong Kong relationship is something I wanted to talk about in this project. I was interested in how to depict the past, the present, and the future of these two places, and how they influence each other through my work.”
The landscape was desolate—tall fences lined the border, and the path was eerily empty. The only sound was the distant hum of the city beyond. For hours, Wong wandered in solitude, searching for the spot his parents had described. They could only remember vague details, but as he approached a stretch of coastline just before sunset, he knew he had found it.
“That coast, the body of water, the mangroves—it was exactly what they had told me about,” he says. “Of course, there weren’t skyscrapers or the city of Shenzhen back then. The China side was just rural villages. At night, it was completely dark.”
The light was fading fast. Wong had only a small window to capture the image before night fell. He hadn’t expected to stay out so long, but fortunately, he had brought a tripod. He worked quickly, adjusting settings, experimenting with different apertures, trying to get the fencing in the foreground just right.
“I took a couple of pictures, all in slightly longer exposure,” he explains. “I wanted to capture the reflections of the sunset and the city lights in the background. I think the purple tone in the image does add something to it.”
Despite the rush, he knew what he wanted. The composition was clear in his mind—his challenge was to balance sharpness and mood. He shot with a medium format GFX digital camera, a choice that suited his low-light style. His preference for underexposing by one or two stops meant he needed a sensor capable of pulling out details from shadows without losing quality. The 4:3 aspect ratio also felt more natural to him than the conventional 3:2.
“I always stick to one lens for a whole project,” Wong says. “50mm works best for me—I can do landscape, portraits, and still life all with this single lens.”
Later, as he sequenced images for his book, he faced another decision. The border photograph was always meant to open the project, but at one point, he considered using an alternative version—a vertical shot with a more pronounced foreground fence. It was a stronger image in some ways, but after letting it sit for a few weeks, he went back to his original choice.
“I felt that the vertical image was just too busy, too loud,” he says. “I preferred to open the book with a more peaceful and quieter image, a mood and tone that I wanted to carry through the whole project.”
The border image became a meditation on history, movement, and identity. Standing there alone, Wong found himself thinking about his parents’ journey—about their fearlessness, their determination, and the impossibility of imagining himself in their place.
“How did they manage to swim across from the other side?” he wonders. “I can’t imagine myself being able to do something like that. They were so young and fearless.”
That moment, caught between fading light and the weight of memory, encapsulated his philosophy on photography. It wasn’t about technical perfection or visual beauty—it was about meaning.
“This image keeps reminding me of what I want to achieve with photography,” he reflects. “I always wish my work could capture the present and talk about the past, while giving hints of the future.”
More stories:
