China

Posts tagged
with China

Documentary

Commodity City: A Fascinating Glimpse Inside the World’s Largest Wholesale Market

The Yiwu International Trade Market in China is the world’s largest wholesale market, stretching nearly five miles and containing over 75,000 individual vendors. Chinese-American film director Jessica Kingdon peeks into the daily lives of the market’s workers in her observational documentary Commodity City, exploring the subtle interactions that occur amongst hoards of dolls, flowers, neon signs, clocks, and other consumer goods.

The work is filmed in long, static shots, mirroring the days each vendor spends inside the consumer metropolis. Commodity City has played in over fifty film festivals, and was shortlisted for the 2017 Cinema Eye Honors. The Brooklyn-based director received her BA in Film Studies from Columbia University and her MA in Media Studies from The New School. In 2017, she was named one of 25 New Faces of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine. You can see more of the short films Kingdon has produced and directed on her website and Vimeo. (via Vimeo Staff Picks)

Photography

A Rare Glimpse at a Deserted Great Wall of China Captured by Andres Gallardo Albajar

This past February architectural photographer Andres Gallardo Albajar traveled to the Great Wall of China where he was able to take in a rare sight—one of the seven wonders of the world without a single soul to be seen. Albajar had expected to create the same tourist-filled images as others who visited the architectural feat, however when he arrived he found a thick fog encapsulating the structure. The dense cover may have been a deterrent for tourists, but this particular weather added further mystery to the deserted landscape Albajar captured in this recent series.

“I was expecting big amounts of people, even lines to access or things like that, but for my surprise there was very few people, which allowed me to capture the wall with no people, which in my opinion helps to create a more surreal and magic feeling,” Albajar tells Colossal.

You can view more of the Spanish photographer’s work, including his multi-part series on urban geometry, on his website, Instagram, and Behance.

Photography

An Aerial Tour of an Abandoned Chinese Fishing Village by Joe Nafis

The small fishing village of Houtouwan on the Chinese island of Shengshan has been abandoned since the 1990’s. Due to increased competition with nearby Shanghai and a depleted fishing supply, residents were forced to find work in other towns, leaving their own coastal village to the whim of Mother Nature.

Today the ghost town is only visited by tourists curious to see the vine-wrapped homes and other buildings swallowed by untamed greenery. Shanghai-based photographer and videographer Joe Nafis visited the area last year with fellow photographer Dave Tacon. It took them nearly 36 hours to reach the village due to lack of ferries or connection with other towns in the area. Once in town, Nafis explored the area on foot, as well as from above with his drone.

“Using the drone to explore the village first was a good idea as the paths were not well maintained and overgrown,” Nafis tells Colossal. “Some of the buildings were in tatters, while others looked like they were going through a remodel. It was all very strange. On the Sunday there were a few tourists, about ten to fifteen, and then on Monday we were the only people in the village other than the three to four that still lived there.”

You can view drone footage from the photographer’s visit to the overgrown village in the video below. He recently released an aerial time lapse video focusing on Shanghai’s urban development over the last seven years on his website, and more video-based projects by Nafis can be found on his Instagram and Vimeo. (via This Isn’t Happiness)

Art

Paper-Cast Sculptures of Legs and Torsos Covered in Traditional Chinese Paintings by Peng Wei

Beijing-based artist Peng Wei places traditional Chinese painting on rice paper to create contemporary sculptures of human legs, shoes, and torsos. These paper-cast works display scenes of the natural and domestic, including lush gardens, animals, and interiors of Chinese homes. Peng has been troubled by the adoption of Western styles of clothing by Chinese women. By painting classical Chinese motifs on Western shoes and other fashion-related items, Peng aims to deny the decline of China’s cultural heritage to rapid globalization.

Peg was born in Chengdu in 1974 and graduated from the Eastern art department of Nankai University with a BA in Literature and an MA in Philosophy. Her works have been collected by the National Art Museum of China, the Hong Kong Museum of Art, the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, the Guangdong Art Museum, and many more international collections. You can see more of Peng’s paintings and sculptures on Artsy. (via Lustik)

Art

Life-Size Cardboard Sculptures of Chinese Villagers Tap Into Artist Warren King’s Ancestral Heritage

Warren King began sculpting with cardboard as an attempt to add fantasy to the lives of his children, creatively crafting masks and helmets out of the recyclable material. This slowly evolved into a more time-consuming arts practice as King began focusing less time on costumes, and more time making large sculptures of his own. After a visit to his grandparents’ village in Shaoxing, China, the New York City-based artist felt compelled to more deeply connect with his cultural past. This sparked Grandfather’s Friend, and Arrival Times, a series of life-size cardboard recreations of his ancestors. 

“During my first visit to China about 7 years ago, I visited the village and spoke with residents who actually remembered my grandparents from over 50 years ago,” said King. “It was a pivotal experience for me, one that inspired me to become an artist. Through my work, I am attempting to understand the fragile connections to people and culture, and examine whether those connections, once broken, can be restored.”

King’s cardboard sculptures will be shown in the exhibition Art of Asia at the Peninsula Fine Arts Center from February 2 to March 28, 2018. You can see more of his work on his Instagram and Flickr.

Photography

Ultraviolet Break of Day: A Midnight Walk Through the Neon-Hued Streets of Asian Cities by Marcus Wendt

While on a recent trip through Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Seoul, London-based photographer Marcus Wendt found himself suffering from a bout of jetlag induced insomnia and ended up wandering the streets of several cities late at night. With a camera in-hand he captured these mesmerising shots that channel the cyberpunk vibe of movies like Bladerunner where narrow urban alleys are bathed in cool ultraviolet light. Over several days Wendt worked his way through the Kowloon area of Hong Kong and then Shenzhen’s Huaqiangbei area known for its sprawling electronics market, before eventually traveling to Seoul. You can see more from the project on his website. (via Colossal Submissions)

Seoul, South Korea