Portraits from Above
— Hong Kong's Infomal Rooftop Communities
By Rufina Wu and Sefan Canham
276 pages, full-color
H248mm x W225mm
Bilingual (English & Chinese)
ISBN 978-988-99843-8-0
HK$235 (inclusive of delivery)
US$36 + postage fee (outside Hong Kong delivery)
Self-built settlements on the roofs of high-rise buildings have been
an integral part of Hong Kong’s history for over half a century. Rooftop
structures range from basic shelters for the disadvantaged to intricate
multi-storey constructions equipped with the amenities of modern life.
Rufina Wu (Canada) and Stefan Canham (Germany) utilize the tools of
an architect and the tools of a photographer to document rooftop communities
on five buildings located in older districts in the Kowloon Peninsula,
slated for redevelopment by the Urban Renewal Authority of Hong Kong.
Text records of the residents’ stories, measured drawings of each distinct
rooftop structure, and high-resolution images of the domestic interiors
of more than twenty households offer an unprecedented insight into
the everyday life on Hong Kong’s rooftops.
大半個世紀以來，在高樓大廈天台自建的住房，已成為香港歷史不可或缺的一部分。天台屋的規模，可以簡單如貧窮戶的簡陋居室，又或複雜如多層建築組成，並備有現代化設計和設施的房子。鄔南薰和斯特凡•坎漢透過文字故事、建築繪圖和高解像照片，記錄五個座落於九龍舊區（現亦成為香港市區重建局選定進行重建的地方）大廈的天台戶，敘述二十多個天台屋居民的故事，展現一個嶄新的香港天台屋視野。
About the Author
Rufina Wu was born
in Hong Kong in 1980. She studied at the University of Waterloo in Canada
where she completed degrees in Environmental Studies and Architecture.
She was a CCSEP Visiting Scholar at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China
from 2005 to 2006...
About
the Author
Stefan Canham was born in England
in 1968. He studied Film at the Hochschule fur bildende Kunste in
Hamburg, Germany and has been working free-lance on documentary photo
and television projects since 1995...