Observational Photography.
After exploring Chongqing separately for most of the day we met at Chongqing’s oldest tea house (it’s only about 60 years old, which shows how quickly the city moves on). It is essentially where people meet for tea, and where (mainly older) men play Mahjong, Draughts and cards, in a tumbledown, wooden building. Amongst the tea drinkers is a flock of art students from the very nearby Sichuan Institute of Fine Art. They are all armed with sketchbooks and charcoals and have come to study the faces of the old men playing Mahjong. Added to this scene today, are two strange looking foreign women, photographing the old men and art students and in return are also being watched and drawn. It is a bizarre situation of mutual observation. But the observation doesn’t really extend beyond mild curiosity, it’s all very relaxed.
The idea of watching and looking is something that we are very aware of at the moment. In Chongqing, as well as being artists, who are here to work, we are also tourists, and are constantly exploring and photographing what we find. Nina even more so, as she is out and about every day in Huang Jai Ping (the area where we live) seeking out places and activities to inform her work. In this area almost every aspect of everyday life is visible from the street. We are trying to find a balance, when stumbling through peoples lives, of when to photograph, when just to look and when to turn round and walk away.
Jessica Longmore
19th November
Chongqing
