1920s Chinatown Insider

The May’s Photo Studio is named for its co-owner, Isabelle May Lee, who everyone knew simply as May.  She was the third child among seven daughters and one son. Her father was a successful businessman and interpreter, which gave the family social status in Chinatown.

Many of May’s photographs include a seal for the studio's name in English and Chinese (精美映相館). Because “mei” also means beautiful in Chinese, the characters can translate as “Refined, Beautiful Reflections Photo Studio.” Thus, the studio seal has a double meaning.

Over time, May became better known for her community service, often working with women’s organizations in fundraising – as in this delicately hand-colored 1924 photograph in which May appears holding a box at the far right. 

As historian Judy Yung explains, Leo came to photography late in life. His surname was Chan, but purchased identity papers from an American family with the surname Lee to escape China and enable his entry into the United States during the Chinese Exclusion Act as a “paper son.” 

During the years of the Chinese Exclusion Act, the Chinese were the only nationality required to have identity papers with photographs. May’s Studio produced many such portraits, but their studio photographs more importantly created a sense of community identity and pride.

There is a long history of Chinese community photography that dates back to the Gold Rush. Many early portrait subjects were seated in symmetrical poses that recalled Chinese ancestor paintings. In the 1860s and 1870s, photographer Lai Yong was also a painter and an activist.  

In this studio portrait, a gentleman identified as baritone Walter Low sits against a hand-painted backdrop. His symmetrical pose recalls early Chinatown photo portraiture. But the pack of dogs, cigar and half-smile imbue his portrait with a contemporary sensibility and humor.

Among the best-known Chinatown professionals was Dr. Margaret Chung, who opened her practice in 1922.  Chung wore masculine clothing and openly had relationships with women. She was also an advocate for the military and lobbied for the creation of the US Naval Women’s Reserves.

Chang “Chester” Lee was a dentist who Leo and May considered to be family. They took their son Stanford and extended family to his dental office at 750 Grant Avenue.  The flowers in the foreground suggest this photograph might be commemorating that office’s opening day.

May’s Studio was Chinatown’s premiere wedding photographer during the 1920s, documenting styles that incorporated elegant lace and elaborate veils. May’s photography business extended to some non-Chinese weddings in neighboring North Beach, San Francisco’s “Little Italy.”

May’s Studio mastered darkroom techniques of hand-painting, dodging and burning, and rephotographing collaged images to create magical effects, as seen in these two opera portraits. The image on the right appropriates an earlier, famous photograph of Mei Lanfang by Yung Cheong.

The hair-thin line of white at the woman’s sleeve suggest that these figures were removed from their original context with the use of scissors, combined with another print, and then rephotographed. Here, photography’s alchemical emulsion smooths over physical cuts.

Maquettes that combined original prints into one suggests that he also used a process of positive/negative/positive – that is, turning a photographic print into a negative, which he then combines with another negative , to reunite families.

He breaches the space between the photograph on the left and the man on the right, excerpting the young boy and placing him next to his father’s shoulder to create a more balanced composition. 

A table bearing flowers conceals the seam, easing the transition between families, the material border of the picture plane, the geographic borders that separated families.

Much like the actors at the Great China who were only allowed into the United States as temporary entertainers, the families pictured in these photographs could slip out of their context & transverse temporal and geographic gaps only by surrendering the fullness of their flesh.

May’s photography magic was also sometimes put to use in collaging and rephotographing storefronts where reflections in shop windows and shadows in doorways might have obscured the display of merchandise, as in this photo of the Chung Wah China Emporium at 733/755 Grant Avenue. 

Because flowers represent wealth, status and good fortune in traditional Chinese culture, it is no wonder that the opening celebrations for new Chinatown shops and businesses featured elaborate floral arrangements, and sometimes lion dancers to bring luck and drive away evil.