Isabella Leung

Photography and film · Edinburgh

My photography is about reflection, time and the people close to me, and it has changed with each stage of my life. I studied overseas in England, where my pictures were of friends and the places we passed through. After university, while I was looking for work, I felt stuck, and I photographed that feeling.

In 2022 I moved from Hong Kong to Scotland. Since then family has become the centre of my work, especially our cat, Yoda, and photography has been a way of finding peace in a new home. I also made two short films with classmates while studying Media Studies at the University of Surrey.

Photographs

A young man leans his head on a glass cafe table, holding a camera, with his reflection doubled in the glass.

Fantasy

Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong · 2014

Taken at a Starbucks on the Tsim Sha Tsui promenade, which was later demolished during the promenade’s redevelopment. A friend poses with his camera, doubled in the glass table. For me it is also about youth fading, since the place it was made no longer exists.

Black and white photograph of one young woman resting her head on another’s shoulder, eyes closed, in a bright station.

Youth

On the way back to Guildford · March 2015

Taken at a station after a day at Windsor Castle, on the way back to Guildford. My flatmates and I were studying far from home at the University of Surrey, and we always had something to lean on.

Overhead view of an abandoned bicycle half buried in grey river mud among shallow pools.

Stuck

New Territories, Hong Kong · 2018

Some things we throw away don’t break down. They just stay where they land, slowly taking on the colour of the place. Shot from above, an abandoned bicycle sits in the mud of a river bed among pools and smaller debris, half-buried but still whole.

A rain puddle on a cobbled street in Palermo reflecting the buildings above, with two people walking in the distance.

Fresh

Palermo, Sicily, Italy · 2018

After rain in Palermo, a puddle on a worn stone street holds the buildings above it. In the water the weathered facades look cleaner and newer than the ones in front of me, and the passers-by turn upside down. The image is about how a reflection can soften what it shows.

An older couple rest on two stone benches in a park, small beside a tall flowering agave and large oleander bushes.

A Pause

Palermo, Sicily, Italy · 2018

An older couple rest on a pair of stone benches in a quiet park in the evening. The plants around them are far bigger than they are, with a flowering agave rising out of the centre of the frame, so an ordinary pause starts to look like a scene from a dream.

Low angle photograph of a blurred white cat in the foreground, with a man crouching on the floor behind it.

Chase, Floor Level

Family home · November 2024

Yoda is a blur of white fur, and John is just behind him, down on the floor, laughing. They chase each other round the house every day. However the day has gone, watching them is one of my happiest moments.

A black and white cat sits on a windowsill, looking out at snow-covered roofs.

First

Our home · 2 January 2025

Our first winter in the first home we bought ourselves, and the first snow I saw from its window. Yoda, then not yet a year old, turns on the sill to watch it, his white fur almost the same colour as the roofs outside. Since moving in, family has become the centre of my photography, and Yoda most of all.

A window reflection layering round lamps over a stone building with green-lit Gothic windows and parked cars.

Alone Time

Edinburgh · April 2026

Taken on my phone while John was away in Hong Kong, the first time I’d been on my own since we got together in 2019. I watched Silent Friend that evening, then had a bowl of Chinese soup noodles at a restaurant, and photographed the street through its window. The reflection puts the lamps inside over the street outside. Having some time to myself made me look at things differently.

Short films

Still from Come & Go: two young men leaning on a garden wall in front of a brick house.

Come & Go

Short fiction film · 5 min 54 s · 2015

University of Surrey, BA Media Studies. Co-produced with Nicole Cheng and Ulkar Nusratli. My role: co-producer, with a lead on camera work and sound recording.

Made for a brief on the seven deadly sins, Come & Go takes greed as its theme. Theo is trying to get his younger brother Aiden out of an orphanage, and a colleague at the bar where he works offers him another way to make money. The film follows how the money slowly takes the place of his original purpose. We planned it shot by shot, using close-ups of hands and small gestures to carry Theo’s nervousness without dialogue. A repeated door-knock sequence speeds up and changes outfit with each cut to show time passing. I recorded sound across the whole film, from the quiet diegetic sound and wildtrack of the opening scenes to the club and phone-call scenes.

Watch on YouTube
Still from Local Live Music: a young woman sits smiling beside a piano, with a guitar leaning on the wall.

Local Live Music

Short documentary · 10 min 20 s · 2015

University of Surrey, BA Media Studies. Co-produced with Lissie Archer. My role: co-producer, working alongside Lissie across every stage, from planning and filming to sound and editing.

Guildford’s local live music scene was losing its younger audience. This documentary asks why young people are drifting away from live music and why the scene is worth reviving. Presented on camera by Lissie, it moves between interviews with performers, students and audiences and footage from a range of local gigs, using an exploratory camera style to stay close to the performers and the crowd.

Watch on YouTube