Lee Sow Lim is a pioneering and award-winning Singaporean photographer, journalist, presenter and arts educator. He was the first Singapore photographer to receive the Pingat Bakti Masyarakat (Public Service Medal), and later chaired the Cultural Medallion selection panel for photography. Outside of photography, Lee established the Hainanese Drama Broadcast group at Rediffusion radio station.

Lee Sow Lim was born in 1930 in Malaysia where he had his primary and secondary school education. After the death of his father, a skilled engineer, he moved to Singapore with his mother and sister and took English lessons to improve his prospects. Photo studios were prospering at the time and with the help of a contact, he found work in one, learning to develop photos before he even knew how to take them.

In 1951, he bought his first camera—a Ziess Ikonta—and started to experiment with infrared photography. During the time, many of his fellow photo studio colleagues participated in international photo salons. Joining them, he sent the results of his experiments to salon competitions, sharing the postage cost with a few senior photographers, and won accolades in France and Barcelona, and also in competitions organised by The Sunday Times.

In 1955 he joined the cable radio company Rediffusion as a clerk, advertisement copywriter and photographer, and went on to become a producer and Hainanese presenter. He was asked to set up the Hainanese Drama Broadcast group in 1963, and having resolved issues regarding the standardisation of accents and finding appropriate actors, the broadcasts continued for about 16 years. Wanting to share his love of photography, Lee also started a series of talk shows on photography at Rediffusion, which went on to enjoy a run of more than 200 episodes over four years. He also hosted three photography television programmes for Television Singapura in 1964, 1965 and 1971.

When dialect programmes were not allowed to be broadcast in 1981, Lee left Rediffusion. However, he had already set up his own photo studio business in 1971, the Glory Photo Company, and he focused on running it. Lee also joined the Singapore Photographic Trade Association, rising over the years to eventually serve as its president. He was also a founding member of the South East Asia Photographic Club.

From 1957, Lee also began writing articles on photography for a few Chinese newspapers such as Free Press, Nanyang Siang Pau, Sin Chew Jit Poh, and Shin Min Daily News. He also went on two books in photography. In 1962, Lee began his involvement with arts education at the Adult Education Board, counting Singapore photographer Foo Tee Jun among his students. He went on to teach briefly at the Vocational and Industrial Training Board and Singapore Polytechnic.

Always striving to create photographs using novel angles and perspectives, Lee frequently emphasises the importance he attached to being involved in the whole photographic process, from taking photographs to developing them. After the photographs he took from 1965 to 1975 deteriorated due to poor paper quality, he returned to black and white photography in 1977 but fused this form with colour processing.

In 1978, he became the first photographer to receive the Pingat Bakti Masyarakat (Public Service Medal). From the mid-’80s he sat on several government arts committees, chaired the Cultural Medallion selection panel for photography and was involved in the visual art segments of the Festival of Arts in 1988, 1990 and 1992.

Today, Lee continues to practise photography. A selection of his works is housed at the National Museum of Singapore and the National Archives of Singapore.