The Chinese Photographers Global Brands Are Banking On

Chinese fashion photography has come a long way since Chen Man’s breakthrough in 2012. Subsequent years saw Leslie Zhang and Ren Hang work for major names like Prada, Gucci and Louis Vuitton. More recently, the industry got to know Julian Song through his striking images for Uniqlo and Hailun Ma through her standout editorials for Vogue. But the clearest sign yet of the growing influence of Chinese talent came this year when Hermès tapped Song for a global campaign.

Sam Ross, who signed Song to his London-based agency New School Represents, says Chinese photographers have become increasingly bankable over time. Many of them now “offer a unique point of view which transforms the value of an image,” said Ross, noting that this is even more the case when the shoot is produced and set in Asia.

Big brands like Loewe, Miu Miu and Balenciaga continue to tap Chinese photographers to shoot local campaigns. Recent examples include the Qixi campaign for Lemaire by Mengyu Zhou and Annie Lai’s Lunar New Year visuals for Byredo. As Betty Sze, vice president of Models.com, says, “It makes sense for brands to use photographers that know their markets.”

The demand for local campaigns has been reinforced by the global rise of celebrities from Asia, as fashion brands and magazines feature them in a growing number of campaigns and editorials. Yet Chinese photographers are no longer hired solely for their fluency with the local market. Theo Liu’s cover of Hailey Bieber for Interview magazine suggests they are increasingly sought for their unique artistry and broader appeal.

That shift has been driven in part by demand for content back in China. According to Ziqian Wang, a photographer who has worked for Prada, Chanel and Loro Piana, there are “more and more commercial channels now” that require imagery beyond the usual raft of lookbooks, product shots and ads. Content created for Chinese platforms is increasingly shared and repurposed across global social media networks, giving photographers greater visibility beyond their home market.

Versatility has become one hallmark of Chinese photographers. Unlike in the West, where many image-makers build careers around an instantly recognisable but narrowly defined signature, Chinese photographers are often expected to move between different aesthetics depending on the client and brief. The result is a market that rewards range as well as originality.

Simply put, you “need to be able to shoot differently,” said Youpo Jiang, the founder and creative director of Shanghai-based production agency Mobius Hub. “Sometimes, if you are too distinctive in your own style, you might narrow your commercial opportunities. If [Chinese] clients don’t see that you are able to do certain styles, they often just assume you can’t do them.” This trait won’t work for some clients, but it could give some Chinese image-makers an edge as they compete for international assignments that demand a broader creative range.

Another distinguishing feature is that the local fashion ecosystem has evolved with fewer agents and gatekeepers, a dynamic that encourages some photographers to adopt a more entrepreneurial approach and gives others greater creative freedom. “As we go hyper-contemporary in the West, you still have the option to play in China,” explained Ross. “It’s very editorial-led where you can have the upper hand in terms of props and sets.”

To make themselves more visible to international clients, some photographers are not only signing with Western agents but relocating to, or spending more time in, the big four fashion capitals. Established talent Jumbo Tsui has relocated to Paris — where he works with the French edition of GQ magazine — and Jin Jia Ji, whose work has appeared in Milan’s Arxipelag magazine, is now based between London and China.

Taken together, the work of these photographers challenges the notion of a singular movement emerging out of China. As Austin Feng, fashion director at W Magazine China, points out, “Photography styles in China today are quite diverse.”

Others are pursuing a more traditional path, building the kind of distinctive signatures that helped earlier photographers such as Chen Man and Ren Hang break through. Some can be as uncompromising about their clientele as they are about the trade-off between commercial and creative projects. Georg Rulffes, who signed Feng Li in 2017 at London-based Concrete agency, says the photographer has been known to turn down high-paying work if it’s not interesting enough.

What unites many of these newer names is a move away from the Chinese aesthetics Western fashion clients once expected. As Jiang suggests, China’s contemporary photographers aren’t trying to explain China, romanticise it or package it into something easily digestible. Some of their work feels “much more internal, confident and psychologically specific. And paradoxically, that specificity is exactly what allows the work to travel globally — and makes them bankable.”

The buzz surrounding half a dozen Chinese photographers suggests Jiang may be right.

Julian Song

Song’s Hermès campaign attests to the growing recognition of Chinese photographers as global storytellers. “As a client, he will challenge you,” says Ross of his appeal. From his Shanghai studio, Song produces hyper-saturated, playful imagery defined by movement, dance and unexpected poses. Subjects are seen on the roofs of cars, submerged in ball pits or suspended mid-air.

A regular contributor to T Magazine China and Modern Weekly, Song has already attracted international clients ranging from Thom Browne, for whom he shot a Lunar New Year campaign, to Moynat, for which he photographed a global pet-themed campaign. His has also worked for Louis Vuitton, Byredo and Uniqlo.

Annie Lai

Chinese photographer Annie Lai was born in New Zealand but is now based between Shanghai and London. She credits her cross-cultural background for shaping an aesthetic that finely balances Asian and Western influences. The result is a body of work that celebrates intimacy through fleeting or unusual moments, appearing in Modern Weekly and the Chinese editions of T Magazine, Another and Harper’s Bazaar.

Lai has shot local and global campaigns for luxury brands including Gucci, Dior, Alexander McQueen, Saint Laurent and Calvin Klein. London-based casting director Shaun Beyen, who counts Maison Margiela and The Row among his clients, recalls working with Lai on a jewellery editorial for the US edition of Elle magazine. “As a female photographer, she had a very personal way of connecting with, and seeing, her sitters and subjects. This unique approach comes through quite powerfully in the final results which often hint at a deep psychological methodology,” he said.

Feng Li

Feng Li, often referred to as the Martin Parr of China, began his career as a civil servant-photographer for the government of Sichuan province. His agent, Georg Rulffes, secured Li’s first major international placement with a 30-page spread in System magazine, helping pave the way for commissions from Bottega Veneta and Balenciaga. Li uses high-intensity flash as a signature tool, lending his imagery a raw, observational edge defined by saturated colour and a knack for making the mundane appear surreal.

Li operates from a completely different instinct, rendering his images accidental, strange and full of life, according to Jiang. “He captures a kind of surrealism embedded in ordinary contemporary life without forcing it into an art-school aesthetic,” she says. What makes his work resonate globally is that the humour and absurdity are never manufactured for an international gaze. “Instead, they come from a very real observation of people, behaviour and public space.”

Nick Yang

Born in Hunan and based in Shanghai, Nick Yang represents a new wave of self-taught talent reimagining fashion photography for Chinese audiences. Yang cut his teeth as an assistant to Wu Zeng, where he expanded his network of editors, stylists, makeup artists and hairstylists before going solo in 2020. Moving fluidly between styles, he produces images with a distinctly cinematic quality. “I feel like my style keeps changing all the time, but at its core, it’s always pretty classic,” Yang told BoF.

According to stylist Feng, Yang is a “very versatile and highly adaptable” photographer whose work is well suited to an international market. “He is very good at controlling lighting and is especially adept at expressive black and white narrative portraiture imagery,” Feng states. Yang’s clients in China include Hermès beauty, Bulgari and Tom Ford. This year he shot a Lunar New Year campaign for Loewe and is signed to the French artist management and production company Birth LX.

Sihao Li

“Photography is usually not about expressing a specific thing, but rather a question mark left by a person when looking at a photo. I don’t know what this question mark is, but I know what I need to do,” says Sihao Li, about his craft. Born in southern China in 1997 and based in Shanghai, Li regularly shoots for Modern Weekly and the local editions of Vogue, W, T Magazine and GQ. Clients include Miu Miu, Bottega Veneta, Versace, Chanel and Ferragamo.

Lucia Liu, stylist and founder of the publication TheBallroom, says Li’s work resonates with audiences because of its modern yet romantic aesthetic and his intuitive understanding of fashion. “I think he really understands how to choose the right landscape or location and then has an ability to make that specific to the look he’s shooting,” she says.

Ziqian Wang

Ziqian Wang studied fashion photography at New York’s School of Visual Arts and credits her time outside China with shaping her creative development. Her work is defined by quiet, intimate imagery that prioritises observation over spectacle. “I like quiet narratives. I don’t like to objectify my subjects…I want to be an observer, an equal,” she notes of her approach.

Working with a “very stable” team of six, alongside collaborators in set design, creative direction and retouching, Wang bases most of her work in Beijing, where celebrity shoots account for much of her schedule. She has shot for the local editions of Vogue, Wallpaper, GQ and Elle, as well as titles such as TheBallroom and Chinese brands Peacebird, Enweis and make-up brand Judydoll. International clients include Prada, Tiffany & Co., Chanel, Nars, Nike and Loro Piana.

Wu Zeng

With a career spanning more than a decade, Wu Zeng has built a reputation for images that combine kinetic energy with psychological depth. His ability to balance commercial demands with a more experimental visual language has attracted clients such as Prada, Dior, Versace, Tiffany and Emporio Armani, alongside editorial commissions from Modern Weekly and the Chinese editions of W, Another and Wonderland.

“Zeng’s images carry an atmosphere and psychological weight that resonates internationally,” says Jiang.