Liam Wong — Parenthetical Recluse

Presenting: a conversation with director, game designer, and photographer Liam Wong on his two sublime books of photography, TO:KY:OO and the just-released AFTER DARK.

In which: we discuss the creative spark of side projects turned obsessions; the nature of seeing; inspirations – including MIRROR'S EDGE, COLLATERAL, and HEAT – and the evolving nature of our realtionships to them; zines; taking creative risks; and letting your work be a creative spark for others in need.

About Liam

Liam Wong -リアム・ウォン - is a director. game designer and photographer, best known for defining, designing and directing visual identities and was listed as one of forbes magazine’s influential 30 under 30.
Born and raised in Scotland - within two years of graduating, Wong moved to Canada - becoming the youngest director at Ubisoft, the video game company behind Far Cry and Assassin’s Creed. In parallel with his blossoming career in video games, Wong was teaching himself photography.

In December 2015 he purchased his first DSLR (a Canon 5D III) and his debut photo series: 'Tokyo Nights (TO:KY:OO)’ - capturing the beauty of night through moments after midnight - inspired by sci-fi, neon-noir, cyberpunk and Japanese animation - gained over a million views worldwide, accumulating a following online and kickstarting his journey into photography. Wong has since collaborated with many high profile companies, artists, musicians and directors. His work has been recognized by media outlets such as BBC, Forbes, Business Insider, Saatchi and Adobe. Full press list available here.

In 2019 ‘TO:KY:OO’ became the largest crowdfunded book in the UK and has remained a best-selling book since launch. It is available for purchase at: ‘TO:KY:OO’. Includes words by game creator Hideo Kojima and visual futurist Syd Mead.

In 2021, his second book ‘AFTER DARK’ raised $280k in pledges, surpassing the funding outcome of his first book. ‘AFTER DARK’ releases October 2022 and is now available.

Chapters

00:00 - Introduction
01:21- “I just felt this release of creativity that I hadn’t felt before…”
06:50 - “I’m at a point in my (photography) where people don’t know that I work in video games…”
12:28 - “If it’s a rainy night in Seoul and I know it’s going to be empty, there’s nowhere I’m going to be other than this Zaha Hadid building…”
17:45 - “When I think of rain, I think of music…”
24:12 - “I think back to the people that inspired me… It felt like the right thing to encourage people…”
35:54 - “With (AFTER DARK) I wanted to make sure the content was solid and the color grading was secondary…”
47:00 - “It gave me that second wind where I didn’t have it before…”
51:45 - What medium or media other than your own would you like to play with?
53:20 - What’s your greatest fear with your work?
55:10- Conclusion

Selected Gallery

A few of my personal favorites from Liam's work. View these and more at liamwong.com.

Linkage

View his work and order his books (and more) via his website, liamwong.com.
Find him on Twitter and Instagram, @liamwong, and around the web via his linktree page.
An interview with Liam via UNSEEN, the new games studio founded by Ikumi Nakamura, where he serves as Visual Director.

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