Award-winning Hong Kong photographer wants to show unknown China to the world

It will come as no surprise to learn that amateur Hong Kong photographer Tugo Cheng is an architect by trade. Look through his portfolio and you’ll see that his images, many of vast landscapes in remote parts of China, are dominated by geometrically sharp lines and freakish symmetry.

And nowhere is this better captured than in Farming in the Sea, Cheng’s image that was shortlisted last month for the Sony World Photography Award. One of a record breaking 230,000 entries, the photo was taken in Fujian Province and shows a man aqua-farming between long bamboo rods.

“I was fascinated by those patterns,” says Cheng as he settles into a chair at the foyer of the Asia Society in Hong Kong's Admiralty district.

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He opens his iPad and flicks through thumbnail after thumbnail of images before zooming in on the impressive picture. “It shows how humans unintentionally shape the environment, creating interesting sceneries when they are looking for food.”

While focusing on capturing shapes, Cheng also likes to add a human element to add dimension to a photograph, resulting in an almost abstract finish.

“This image is not an aerial shot,” he says, correcting me. “I was standing on a mountain and I could see this farmer going about his work, aquaculture – farming oysters and other seafood. It looked like a Chinese painting – or a line drawing. That’s how I like to do landscape photography, from an artistic perspective.”

The image is part of a black and white series called “Discovering Fujian”.