photography award 2025

This project adopts a satirical tone to explore the resurgence of superstitions in Hong Kong and the exploitation of vulnerable communities through certain cultic practices. By mixing several media - manipulative manual, photographs, videos and performances - Kurt Tong plans to embody a fake Taoist priest, afin to question the way certain pseudo-spiritual figures hijack belief systems for lucrative fins.

In this way, the artist seeks to provoke a critical reflexion on the mechanisms that drive individuals to turn to superstition in times of uncertainty, while revealing the subtle manipulation techniques employed by fraudulent leaders. True to his approach, this research is rooted in personal and family experience.

hong kong

Born in 1977 in Hong Kong, where he now lives, Kurt Tong left his hometown at the age of 13 to move to the UK. There, he continued his training while traveling in Europe, America and Asia. A photographer since  2003, since 2006 he has been developing a practice that closely blends archives and photographs, in connection with the history of China. Books play a central role in his work.

In 2019, he will publish The Queen, The Chairman and I, a visual and narrative account that reconnects him with his Chinese roots. The work interweaves, on several levels, the history of Hong Kong over the last century and that of the Asian diaspora through the destiny of his own family. This project has been widely exhibited across four continents.

In 2021, he received the Prix Elysée for Dear Franklin, a project conceived as a book retracing the life of Franklin Lung. Through a subtle montage of letters, press articles and photographs, it evokes the history of the Chinese diaspora in the first half of the 20th century.