Vancouver photographer discovers his culture by documenting Chinatown
Jonathan Desmond Wong’s new book, I Was Lured Into a Tea Shop, consists of three years’ worth of images
In documenting Chinatown for his book I Was Lured Into a Tea Shop, Jonathan Desmond Wong learned that his late grandfather was a member of the Wong Association. Photo by Jonathan Desmond Photography
HAVING GROWN UP in the suburbs, Jonathan Desmond Wong didn’t spend much time in Vancouver’s Chinatown. His parents or grandparents would take him for small grocery shops on occasion, but he felt little connection to his cultural roots. That changed once he was well into adulthood.
Picking up a camera became a portal to self-discovery. The journey has culminated in a new book, I Was Lured Into A Tea Shop. It captures the complexities, character, and changing face of present-day Chinatown.
“I started to develop an interest in discovering who I was, which led to trying to figure out what it meant to be Chinese,” Wong tells Stir. “I didn’t do a deep dive into this until photography started to play a role. Photography came into my life quite late, as I didn’t grow up in the darkroom and was more into music in my early years. But once I got into photography, it profoundly changed everything and I found myself finding reasons to explore and take pictures.”
Photo by Jonathan Desmond Photography
Jonathan Desmond Wong specializes in documentary-style photography.
After doing a photowalk with documentary photographer Daniel Milnor, he became inspired to do a one-year documentary photo project of his own. The founder of Jonathan Desmond Photography and a father of a two-year-old girl, he wanted something that he could commit to—taking photos every single day—and that would hold personal significance. It clicked one day when he walked into Burnaby’s Crystal Mall food court: the sights, sounds, and smells brought him back to those childhood trips holding his parents’ hands to Chinatown. One year of committing to photography turned into three years' worth of images that appear in his book. He has plans for a follow-up.
As part of his documentation of the neighbourhood, Wong explored and became involved in the Wong Association, which preserves the culture, history, and stories of early Chinese Canadian immigrants from the Wong clan. He learned that his late grandfather (kung kung in Chinese) was from a village in South China, though not the main Toi San village from which many of the association’s members claim their lineage.
“My grandfather passed away many years ago but documenting the Wong Association as part of my project felt like I was continuing a conversation with him,” Wong says.
Most of the photographs in the 156-page I Was Lured Into A Tea Shop were captured on film then developed digitally. Prior to be released in book form (in hard- and softcover), Wong’s project was featured in the Journeying through Chinatowns photography exhibit at Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden.
Photo by Jonathan Desmond Photography
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