Art | Photography: ‘La Vie en Macau’ unveiled

Antonio Leong

The opening ceremony of a photography exhibition was held this week at the Albergue SCM, showcasing the latest works of Macau local Antonio Leong.
Entitled, “La Vie en Macau” (Life in Macau), the exhibition divides approximately three-dozen works into subtopics of “Life in Macau” and “This is Macau,” which showcase ordinary people living their lives in the MSAR and interesting scenes from around the city respectively.
What binds these two categories together, both of which are intended for local audiences, is that it is nearly impossible to identify any of the subjects in his photographs and it is almost as difficult to pin down the exact location of any of the scenes.
“I don’t want to identify anyone in my photos,” revealed Leong. “I just want people to see that this is how we live. I want the reader to ‘feel’ the story in the photographs […] in fact I refused to caption the photos [for this reason].”
“The message throughout my works is that there are many moments and memories, pre-gaming and even after the gaming came, that people who grew up here will relate to,” Leong told the Times.
“And I want to show people that we can still preserve our culture and history. We are more than just a gambling city,” he added.
Asked about the vibrancy of the colors in his photographs, Leong said that he edits them to fine-tune the colors and make them stand out more.
“Personally I am a fan of Western-style oil paintings, so I really want to bring out some of those colors,” he said.
The colors of yellow, red and green can even be used to represent Macau, the artist added. “It reminds them [locals] that our city is beautiful – that there is inner beauty here,” added Leong.
The exhibition will be open to the public until June 11. Admission is free. Daniel Beitler