In the early 1960s, a period when mainland China was closed to the outside world, Hong Kong offered a window into traditional Chinese culture. This is what the late, groundbreaking Swiss-Italian photographer Frank Horvat delved into after being commissioned by the German magazine Revue to document major cities worldwide, alongside writer Dieter Lattmann. Now 51 of Horvat’s monochrome images of Hong Kong are on display in his first solo exhibition in Asia, Hong Kong Dream, at the F11 Foto Museum.
With a career spanning over 70 years, Horvat worked extensively across a range of styles such as photojournalism, fashion and portraiture. Widely recognised as a fashion photographer, his career was sparked by reportage photography, which gained prominence in the 1950s as photography was increasingly recognised as a serious art form. His style of photography focused on humanist depictions of everyday life and people, using techniques such as blurred motion, casual framing and close-ups to create a powerful visual impact.
In his fashion work, Horvat depicted his subjects and spontaneous moments outdoors, in natural light and everyday settings, complementing the rise of prêt-à-porter fashion during France’s postwar years – a movement that replaced exclusive haute couture with more accessible clothing styles. This fresh, documentary-like approach revolutionised fashion photography and earned Horvat global acclaim with his dynamic images featured in leading agencies and magazines such as Magnum and Harper’s Bazaar.
Douglas So, owner and founder of F11 explains that after visiting Horvat at his studio and meeting his daughter and studio administrator Fiammetta in Paris, he thought it would be fitting to bring them back to Hong Kong “to let others enjoy the timeless charm of the city through Frank’s perspective.” Following the success of two previous exhibitions spotlighting Werner Bischof and Ed van der Elsken’s images of Hong Kong throughout the 1950s, So wanted to create another show to have a similar impact. These photographers all share a commonality: they captured Hong Kong’s daily life in a way that is intimate and historically revealing.
Unlike Bischof and van der Elsken, who both visited many areas including the New Territories, Horvat only spent a few days in the city. He focused on busy urban streets, staying close to his subjects to capture intimate, powerful scenes like mahjong parlours and dai pai dongs, offering a strong personal perspective that belies the short amount of time he spent in Hong Kong.
A humanist approach
Horvat was born to Jewish parents in 1928, in the Italian city then known as Abbazia, which is now Opatija, Croatia. In 1939, on the eve of World War II, Horvat’s family fled the Nazi-allied fascist regime of Italy and sought refuge in the Italian-speaking enclave of Lugano, Switzerland. This history of migration and survival deeply shaped his worldview and artistic sensibility.
After completing fine art studies at Milan’s Accademia di Brera in 1947, Horvat was drawn to photography. Early work at an advertising firm introduced him to the Rolleiflex camera, a staple for professional photographers at the time known for its exceptional image quality. This bulky, waist-level design, which required the photographer to look down into the camera before taking a shot, was heavy and less suited for spontaneous shooting.
On a trip to Paris in the early 1950s, Horvat met various legendary photographers, notably humanist photographer and artist Henri Cartier-Bresson, who encouraged him to embrace the lighter Leica 35mm camera and dive into photojournalism. This shift allowed Horvat to capture candid, real-life moments with more flexibility and authenticity, shaping the distinctive eye that would define his long and influential career.
Horvat, then in his 20s, took Cartier-Bresson’s advice into consideration and embarked on a transformative two-year journey across the globe. He travelled independently as a photojournalist to countries like India and Pakistan, where some of his images were later published in major magazines like Life and featured at the New York Museum of Modern Art’s 1955 exhibition The Family of Man. Seven years later, Horvat’s commission from Revue brought him to Hong Kong.
Unfolding layers of detail
Although Fiammetta Horvat acknowledges that the inspiration for and location of each photo remains uncertain, one thing is clear: her father was drawn to Hong Kong’s multifaceted layers and verticality. The photographer was compelled “to compose a still life,” she says, “to fit all elements he saw in the frame.” Most of the works were thus taken in portrait format to better capture the intense concentration of life from the ground up to the sky, including subjects like tall buildings and crowded streets.
Horvat was fascinated by the wave of mainland Chinese migration that was reshaping Hong Kong in the 1960s, and he was also drawn to the abundance of Chinese writing on the street. Two photos in the exhibition highlight his interest.
One (above left) shows a busy street with well-attired citizens, a man pulling a ricksaw juxtaposed against vehicles in the image’s foreground. As the eye slowly wanders upwards, it is drawn to different elements, from bamboo scaffolding to shops that sold various local products like oyster sauce and Camel brand paint.
The second image (above right) captures a plethora of shop signs, including one for a Shanghainese barbershop (soeng6 hoi2 lei5 faat3 上海理髮) and another a pharmacy called 新生藥行 (san1 sang1 joek6 hong4), which still exists in Mongkok today, selling both Western and Chinese medicine. This packed landscape of signage reveals an ever-developing city where tradition and modernity coexist.
One of Horvat’s personal favourites (above left) shows a child holding up a piece of paper to cover his face – one of the rare photos during the trip where the subject makes direct eye contact with the photographer.
Another highlight is a photo of dried fish (below right) – an undoubtedly pungent but everyday scene that Horvat aestheticises through his lens. Although Horvat likely would not have been aware, salted fish has a cultural association with death and bad luck; haam4 jyu4 (鹹魚) is Cantonese slang for a corpse. In the photographer’s eye, what could have been portrayed as something unpleasant or exotic instead becomes stylish. Throughout her father’s career and wherever he went, says Fiammetta Horvat, “he didn’t denounce anything.” If he showed someone who is poor, he never focused on their hardships. Instead, he always tried to show the “human side of things” empathetically.
So says the photo of dried fish is his favourite in the exhibition. And he also has a different take on its significance, arguing it captures the essence of 1960s Hong Kong by channeling the films of the era. He sees traces of the Nouvelle Vague or New Wave, the influential French film movement characterised by experimentation and personal storytelling, a style later embraced by filmmaker Wong Kar-wai in his seminal 2000 film In the Mood for Love, which explores themes of memory and longing in a seductive urban atmosphere.
Frank Horvat’s legacy
In 1975, Frank Horvat bought an old hangar in the Paris suburb of Boulogne-Billancourt, converting it into a light-filled studio where he lived and worked until his death in 2000. Fiammetta has managed the studio since then. She has taken care to preserve Horvat’s archives, digitising his photos to ensure they can be shared widely and accessed by new generations. Each year, the studio also invites contemporary artists to interact with Frank’s archives in a creative initiative called Dialogue.
In 2023, British artist Antony Cairns was invited by Simon Baker, the esteemed director of the Maison européenne de la photographie in Paris, to engage with Horvat’s works. Cairns, known for his experimental approach to urban photography in cities like Tokyo and Seoul, reinterpreted Horvat’s black-and-white images of 1960s Hong Kong by printing them onto vintage computer punch cards and arranging them in a colourful mosaic. The resulting exhibition, The City and the City, was a lesson in how images of the past can spark new creative conversations today.
Beyond creative interactions sparked by the archives, Horvat’s legacy continues to be defined by own spirit of curiosity and empathy. Eager to discover more about the world around him, he was captivated by the excitement of exploring new places, especially Hong Kong, a unique city that flourished economically and culturally during the 1960s. “Hong Kong has undergone a big transformation since then,” says Fiammetta. “So I wonder what he would think of it now and hope he could still relate to it.”
For all its changes, Fiammetta is confident that Hong Kong will thrive in the future. This optimism is reflected in the show, which pays tribute to hope and resilience by recognising those who persevered through hard times to build a better society. “I hope this exhibition will instill pride in the younger generation, appreciating how far the city has come since their parents’ or grandparents’ earlier days,” she says with a smile.
Hong Kong Dreams runs from June 11 to July 19, 2025 at the F11 Foto Museum. Click here for more information. On June 11, 2025, Fiammetta Horvat will share more about her father’s experiences at the Alliance Française library in Jordan.