The celebrated photographer revisits his decades-old images of the city, transforming them into a towering nocturnal spectacle.
A Full-Circle Moment
Greg Girard’s HK:PM now lights up the façade of Hong Kong’s M+ museum — a sweeping cinematic sequence crafted from photographs he first took in the 1970s and 1980s. Known for documenting Asia’s evolving urban landscapes, Girard describes the commission as a “journey of rediscovery,” bringing his work back to the city that originally inspired it. The display includes scenes of street life, planes descending over Kai Tak Airport, and rare views inside the now-demolished Kowloon Walled City.
Revealing the Reality of the Walled City
Girard’s acclaimed City of Darkness series challenged the popular image of the Walled City as a lawless enclave. Instead, his lens captured a dense architectural labyrinth balanced by a surprising village-like order. “The chaos was more about the buildings than the people,” he says. That spirit, he believes, still exists today — in the resilience and ingenuity of communities that find ways to thrive outside official structures.
Hong Kong, Then and Now
From shooting on film to embracing digital, Girard’s philosophy remains the same: use whatever medium tells the story best. His work is driven not by prewritten narratives but by curiosity — photographing what feels “hidden in plain sight.” Decades after first arriving in Hong Kong as an 18-year-old, his images now return in monumental form, reentering the city’s skyline as luminous fragments of its past and present.
