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The one hundred photographs of Hong Kong and its residents taken between 1858 and 1875 presented in this exhibition offer a multifaceted panorama of the British colony at a turning point in history. Hong Kong was then flourishing and this early first boom was remarkable for its coherence. Traces of this period have been gradually erased by the constant change brought about by the colony’s eventful history in the years that followed.

Many of the images presented were taken by the first generation of locally active photographers such as Beato, Miller, Floyd, Thomson and Afong, alongside works by unidentified photographers. According to Régine Thiriez, curator of the exhibition, the stereoscopic view on albumen paper by Pierre Rossier, dated 1858, is the oldest image of Hong Kong ever recorded.

Photographs come from public and private collections in France, England and the United States including the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Estampes et Photographie, Cartes et plans / Société de Géographie), Musée Guimet, Musée d’Histoire Naturelle de Lille, Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, Wellcome Library (London), Peabody Essex Museum.