An old man with his dog in front of the shanty town where he lives.

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Crumbs Under A Carpet

Emmanuel Serna | Hong Kong

Hong Kong is one of the most prosperous and richest cities in the world, but it is also one of those where inequalities between rich and poor are the highest. Elderly are the poorest in the territory. According to official figures, one in three elderly people live in poverty, about 300,000 people.
"Crumbs under a carpet" is a Hong Kong expression given to poor elderly people, that we want to hide.

To survive, elderly people have no choice but to work, condemned to perform the most difficult and thankless tasks such as collecting waste to recycle or sell it in illegal flea markets.

Housing is another major problem. Among seniors, the luckiest live in public estates, the others in subdivided apartments, huts on roofs or in the countryside, or even on the street.

Many elderly people suffer from loneliness, spending their days alone in parks, at the foot of their buildings or locked up in retirement homes. Often, their only company is their dog. The luckiest ones get together to chat, play, do sports, dance or swim.

Emmanuel Serna (b.1973) is a French Photographer based in Hong Kong.

After graduated from a photography school in Paris, he devoted himself to photography in the Balkans: Kosovo, Serbia and Bosnia, documenting the consequences of civil wars on civilian populations. He has also worked in Eastern Europe: Romania and Turkey, where he became interested in minorities and daily life.

Since 2010, he has lived and worked in Hong Kong, where he focuses his work, as well as in China, where he works on daily life and minorities.

He enjoys photographing people, their relationships with each other and with their environment, and the traces they leave on the landscape.

In addition to his personal work, he works on commission for editorial clients and his photos are regularly published in the French and international press.

His photographs have been presented in solo and group exhibitions in France, Hong Kong and Taiwan.

In addition to his documentary style work, Emmanuel is also an architectural and interior photographer at L'Atelier Photo, which he founded.

He is a member of the French photo agency Divergences Images

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