I am delighted to share the recent publication of an academic article by Joaquin Lopez Mugica and Thomas Whyke, in Asian Studies, about my early Photographic work “Shanghai in JPG” (see link to the PDF at the end).
I conducted this documentary project about the urban transformation in Shanghai between 2004 and 2008, when living there. The authors elaborate a theoretical perspective about Documentary Photography, and how I tried to express a visual relation between space and time, in a period of deep social transition in China. They apply the concept of Chronotope developed by Mikhail Bakhtin. Shanghai in JPG was a seminal project, the first documentary one I conducted in China. For 10 years, I documented places, trying to grasp of sense of what was happening, and about to change the face of the world. I was trying to find my place and sketch my personal story herein. I was a Finance Director in a global corporation, an “amateur photographer” in the noble sense of the term, as rightly labelled by the authors. A wanderer, like in Poet Du Fu’s song, travelling the world, Asia and India, for 25 years or so. Conducting documentary projects helped me build a dialogue, a resonance, with the country and the people, e.g. my Chinese and Asian colleagues, on a different basis. I connected to bigger life constituents, a country, a culture, History, and to people with worldviews and social conditions different of mine. I took on another personal dimension, more conscious of wider stakes, and questioned my goals in life and values. As an introvert person having responsibilities in a high-speed industry, photography helped me find moments of creativity, of reconnection with myself, and of Presence, in unknown environments, in what was not called “Acceleration” yet. What does it mean today? Nothing to deal with nostalgia, then and now. Photography is about Presence and Continuity. That makes it relevant to explore our identity in a fast-changing world. Today, I share with my clients what photography has taught me, to help them deal with acceleration. You can still buy a copy of the “Shanghai in JPG” book, now a collector’s item, published by legendary Beaugeste Gallery owner and curator Jean Loh. Please proceed through the website (see below) or message me. With a big Thank You to Joaquin and Thomas! LOPEZ MUGICA, J., & WHYKE, T. W. (2024). Representations of Post-Industrial Shanghai: Industrial Chronotopes in Documentary Photography. Asian Studies, 12(1), 355–387. https://lnkd.in/e5B9eWwN
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Jean-Philippe Gauvrit
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