18th May 2011 A forest city
I’ve been photographing a lot in the last few days. There’s something that struck me. Perhaps it is the contrast between the old and the new town? Yesterday, from the golden towers, I walked into an area that’s partly demolished. This area has an unusual atmosphere, a landscape that I haven’t seen in all the new areas…..the trees…the trees are higher than the buildings. They grow on the buildings, even grow into them. In a way, the human structures and the nature have grown and intertwined together here. Walking in tree shadows feels very different from walking in the gaps of skyscrapers.
Apart from the new skyscrapers, I’ve also been photographing the new ‘forests’ in the city. In order to build a ‘forest city’, tens of thousands of mature trees have been bought from all over the country and the world. They have their branches seriously chopped and transported to a new place. Then they get a lot of nutrition injected into them. I hope they’ll survive.
On the top of a small hill there’s a steel tower for carrying electric cables. Underneath there’s a bird-keeping club: the Chinese like to keep birds in cages in order to enjoy their singing. Neighbours in this area will bring their birds to this strange place for the ‘fresh’ air. It’s such a sad place…
17th May 2011 The old lady
In the extremely busy area of Yang Jia Ping, an old lady sat on the pedestrian path making old-fashioned shoes by hands. I was drawn to her by her silver hair, extremely-winkled face and slow-moving hands.
She’s eighty-three years old, yet she’s still sitting here in the traffic, working on something extremely delicate. They’re so beautiful, with the time and slow motions that went into them. I bought three pairs, purely out of admiration, for her. Despite her good eyes and hands, she struggled to work out the total price. We told her it’s RMB104, and asked if I could have RMB 4 discount (not for the bargaining, but to see how she would react). She said: “Are you not embarrassed to ask for discount, look how old I am!” Ha, she’s still very smart! So I gave her RMB 105.
Afterwards I tried to find her again, just to watch her working. But she’s nowhere to be seen again.
15th May 2011 A full day in Chongqing
During a photography session in the morning I noticed a group of people gathering at a small, dark corner squeezed between a green belt and a wall. There were incense being burnt so it must have something to do with an ancestor ceremony again. Unable to find a path, I walked through the vegetation to talk to them.
So here is the story: they buried their parents’ cinerary caskets into the rocks of a small outcrop.. Being high on top of a hill and facing the Yangtze River directly with an open view, this used to be a great cinerarium location according to Chinese Feng Shui theory. But over the years so many apartment blocks have been built in this area. The river view is completely obstructed. Further more, property developers also turned this hill into their ‘green belt’ and built more blocks behind the outcrop. In the end a space of only two metes’ width were left for the graves. There is no path or anything for access. As a result, most people decided to dig out the caskets and move them to somewhere else; now only a few caskets are still there. This family decided to keep their dead parents there because “ it’s better if they can avoid moving.”
I asked them how they feel about this. They said: “ The city is developing so fast. We don’t have a choice.” As every Chinese I’ve asked about this kind of situation. They always have the same answer without any doubt or emotional change…..
In the afternoon we went to the old town near Chao Tian Men. I found the messy, organic old town in stark contrast to the posh ‘property show rooms’ which are dominating in the city scenery. We also enjoyed the cable car across the river. With the many new bridges, cable cars are not useful anymore so most of them have be demolished. We even found a beautiful youth hotel with Chinese-style decoration——the first oasis in Chongqing. The city is becoming fuller to me.
13th May 2011 Art in China
I’ve been back to Beijing for some meetings and delivering some talks at Sichuan Fine Art Institute and Chongqing Technology and Business University. The contemporary art scene in China seems very interesting.
In Beijing I talked to a friend who is working on a few financial projects relevant to the arts. According to him some ‘culture assets&equity exchanges’ in China (which are backed up by the state) are currently testing out the market with art works. Apparently one ’exchange’ bought in one painting, then sold it between the staff themselves for a few rounds at first. When the price was bounced high, a lot of public money followed in blindly. So somebody made a lot of money in this game but most of them lost. Now the government has realised the risks in this and is starting to take control. Another ‘exchange’ is said to try a new project using commissioned artworks as a way to generate profit through selling out in auctions.
Up to now, all the artists I’ve met in China seem to make a good living. Almost all the artists in Chongqing teach in universities with a stable salary. Besides that, some collaborate with international funds, others take advantages of the domestic resources. There seems to be a big demand for the arts: paintings and sculptures are particularly popular. A painting by a known artist is easily sold for a few thousands pounds at least. Business in graphic design is good too because they can take up a lot of commercial projects. To teach has another advantage: they have a lot of students to help them in all aspects of the production. For art students, the university fee is higher than normal. But if they can get into a good subject, such as design, they can find highly paid jobs even during the study . Some students take on temporary jobs such as teaching children how to paint. In China many school children choose an art form as a serious hobby, because they can get extra points with this when they have to pass the university entry exams. Therefore art teachers are particularly in demand. Art universities are rich too, for example, Sichuan Fine Art Institute charges about £1,500 per student per year. And they have over 15,000 students!
8th May 2011 Trial Point 5 Playtime with the river
GPS: 29.39”074’N 106.52”999’E Altitude: 534ft
Trial Point 5 is the last point for this trip. Due to limited time we’ll have to catch up with Point 4 on another day. P4 is next to a train station so we don’t need to hire a car.
We drove towards the direction of Yichang, past some farmland and found P5. As usual, people are building a road next to it. By now I’ve come to understand that a water channel like this is an obvious route for us too. So it’s ‘logical’ to see so many ‘riverside road’ being built. I thought of River Ribble in the Yorkshire Dales, there’s always a railway and a road parallel to the river. It’s just that I don’t get to see the time when they were building these. But China is still developing so infrastructures like roads are much needed and are being built everywhere.
So I ignored the muddy road and scrambled downhill to the waterside. For the first time during the trip it’s sunny. So I sun-bathed for a while, played with the water and mud, and took a couple of pictures of the water. On the way up I persuaded myself to take a couple of the road too, in case I’ll need them when pictures are put together.
So far I’ve completed most of the ‘Trial Point System’, but I feel it isn’t time to say if it’ll work on the entire river yet. I still have over two weeks left to learn more about the river.
