China, Lishui part 1

As I mentioned in a few earlier posts, I was invited to China to take part in the Lishui Photo Festival. While my trip encompassed other cities in China, I'll focus on my time in Lishui since, of the cities I visited, that's the place that is probably unknown to most readers of this blog. Lishui is a city in the Southeast corner of China. It's a few hours inland by car, a little north of Taiwan and a little south of Japan. It's in a picturesque valley surrounded by rolling hills and low mountains. It's just the sort of landscape you imagine when you see fog-shrouded Chinese watercolors and ink drawings. But this is no rural village. The city population is over 250,000, and the population of the prefecture of Lishui is in the millions. It's a small city sort of Albany-sized - or maybe Akron, Ohio - and similar to Albany in that it's on a river, close to some more famous, bigger cities, but has some character and history of its own. For China, it's notably lowrise, but the downtown is bigger than you might first think when arriving in the city. It's a town but not a village. It's the kind of place you probably have heard of but never had a reason to go.

To my surprise, many Chinese people had not heard of it. Many people I met in China simply had no idea where Lishui was. So I guess it was no surprise that, despite its size, the city was relatively remote (no local airport) and unfamiliar with Western faces. We were told that the Western group brought to the festival was the largest group of non-Chinese to ever be in the city. In fact, Westerners are rarely there at all (never more than 10 English speakers in the area at one time), so we were openly stared and pointed at. We were told that staring in Chinese culture is not the hostile act that it can be in the West, but some were still intimidated being treated so conspicuously as the Other. For myself, I found that a quick "hello" in Chinese and a smile broke the staring barrier. The awkward, silent stare dissolved into a huge grin with a returned "hello" every time. People seemed conspicuously delighted that we were there once the gawking barrier was broken. Schoolchildren, perhaps only knowing this one word in English, would call out "hello!" to us, and squeal with pleasure and delight when we responded back with a hello in either English or Chinese. Many participants were offered free food, free cab rides, and other spontaneous acts of generosity I would never expect in a dense metropolitan environment like this. People were simply friendlier and more innocently welcoming than in any other city I've been in my life. It's not fair or honest to make a generalization based on such a short and limited trip, I know. I was constantly aware that I didn't have enough information to fully understand the context of what I was experiencing. I felt like my eyes were wide open, but in fact I was peering at China through a very narrow slit in the curtains; what seemed to me to be a panoramic view was in fact edited and incomplete. That being said, I have never been more welcomed into a community where I was so conspicuously not of that community.

One example will serve well. I was invited to nominate 2 artists for the exhibition and bring one of them with me. I asked my friend, Christian Erroi, to be my companion (Cornelia Hediger was the other artist in the show. More on that in a future post). Christian is half Swiss and half Italian. We were walking around downtown looking for a bite of lunch when we saw a small line of local men taking away steaming buns from a hole-in-the-wall lunch counter. While we were standing there trying to decide if this would be the place, one of the guys in line said, "Come here! It's good! Come!". We were thrilled to hear even a few words of English hoping that we might actually be able to have an effortless transaction, but it became clear that we had just heard his entire English vocabulary.

Christian, when he's in a situation where there is no chance that the person he's speaking with will understand any language he knows, will lapse into Italian. I guess he thinks if tone, not words, is what is most important, he might as well speak in his most expressive language. So, he starts talking to the guy in Italian.....and the guy answers back in Italian! What are the odds in a city that hardly sees a Caucasian face that we'll meet a guy who speaks Italian? My own Italian is rusty but serviceable and Christian is a native speaker, so we launch into a real discussion with this guy. It turns out he's traveled some and spent time in Italy and studied the language. We ask him about the food, what's good, what's in it. he insists on ordering for us and making sure we have drinks and the next order of buns.

And here's where it really falls off the map in terms of my experience. We reach for our wallets to pay for lunch, and this guys says, "No. it's my treat". What? No, we insist, we can pay. We're happy to pay. "No. You are my guests", he replies. "We are so happy to have you in our city, it is my pleasure to invite you to lunch". We're speechless. Did we really just get treated to lunch by a total stranger who couldn't wait to have us sample his favorite pork buns? In Italian? In all my travels in the US and Europe, this was unique. I was humbled by this simple, unexpected, un-asked for act of generosity. Mind you, the buns were maybe 40 cents each, but that's 40 cents to us. I have no idea what the price of lunch represented to him in a country where one could very well earn $50 a month. Beautiful.

And people didn't just stare. We were endlessly photographed. If I ever wanted to have a taste of what celebrities feel in the face of paparazzi, this was my chance. Folks pointed cameras at us singly:

And in groups:

It seemed like any time I would look up, there was a huge lens pointed right at me:



But as with the stares, a simple "ni hau" would dissolve the moment into smiles and hellos:



We also seemed to be the object of touristic interest. Shortly after our bun experience, we were standing in front of a small shrine. A family group saw us and raced to have their picture taken with us in front of the monument:

More hurried to be part of the shot:

Ready?

No, the camera guy wanted to be in the shot, too, so he enlisted yet another guy to take the picture:

Now we're ready:

...and the happy picture:

Clearly, Christian knows a thing or two about posing to be a monument. But seriously, this group was just tickled to make this shot and wouldn't let us go until they got it right. We must have been there for 15 minutes. Not a word of English was exchanged, but Christian made himself well-understood in Italian.

The festival organizers made a point of taking us on some field trips to see the surrounding countryside. This was a mixed blessing. While it was a treat to see parts of China I would likely never see again, it took time away from the festival. I ended up not seeing all of the exhibits and failing to meet many of the Chinese artists. Our first trip was to the Zhutan Mountain Scenic Spot.

After seeing Dinghu Peak, I always referred to the day as "Picnic at Penis Rock" (apologies to Peter Weir).


There were no guides so I never learned much about Dinghu Peak, but I decided it probably wasn't Jewish.
Zhutan Park had my favorite "funny sign" of the trip:

But there were more to follow:



As fun as these were (and there were many), I was inspired to imagine what it would be like if the shoe were on the other foot. Can you imagine what a colossal screw-up it would be if the US were required to sign its national parks in Chinese?! Subways? Street signs? We, too, would be treated to the sight of Chinese people doubled over in laughter pointing at some innocuous sign. No question.

This perspective of asking myself what the equivalent experience in the US would be was constantly on my mind. If a busload of Chinese people who didn't speak any English were dropped off in Knoxville, or Boise, or Indianapolis, what reception would they receive? What if they went into a restaurant where there was not a single word on the menu in a language they could understand (as happened to us countless times)? What customs of ours that we take for granted would seem incomprehensibly strange to them? My pessimist side says that they would encounter a cool, suspicious US though, of course, I can never know. It's a hypothetical. Perhaps they wouldn't be treated poorly, but they could not be treated better than we were treated in Lishui. In a place that was as foreign to me as any place I've ever been, I was constantly welcomed and treated well.

As someone pointed out to me, China is a very old, very big, very complicated country. Any attempt to simplify, reduce, or generalize about one's experience is sure to miss the point or, worse, get it completely wrong. All I can say is that I was in one city for one week as an individual, English speaking man. I hope the microscopic sliver of light that I cast on the place illuminates a view that is somehow illustrative and not too off-the-mark in its assumptions. From street markets:

to the daily fish dinner being purchased:

to vistas that confounded my idea of a city:

To markets that were as I've never seen:

Lishui was an adventure I would not have missed for anything. Like my travels to the USSR and Eastern Europe in the late '80s, these are places in such a rapid state of change that if I came back in even a realtively short amount of time I wouldn't find the same place I visited a few weeks ago.

Coming up will be posts on:
Chinese artists exhibited at the Festival
Western artists exhibited at the Festival
Artists and galleries I saw in Shanghai

Stay tuned.....

....and firewalls there were.

I'm sitting in Hong Kong airport and I see that I'm able to open Fugitive Vision for the first time since I left for Hongzhou on November 28th. It was nice to actually see the page open after trying without success for 2 weeks. In any case, China experience posts will start very soon as I'm back on the evening of the 11th. More to come!

Firewalls on the horizon?

Sitting in my Hong Kong hotel room a few days away from a departure for Lishui, China, I read with trepidation the post in Jeff Ladd's 5b4 blog about his own Chinese experience:

Hello all. I am currently in China press checking the next Errata Editions books. Like last year I intended to post a daily report about the making of each book but this year it looks like the Great Firewall of China is raining on my parade. Blogger has been blocked. So I will save all my reports and post them the week of my return. My apologies...

Now I'm curious what blog-blocks I might encounter. It has been my intention to write a diary style account of my week at the festival. If you don't see any posts, draw your own conclusions and be confident that I will be following Mr. Ladd's lead by saving my reports and posting when home. I'm keeping fingers crossed that I'll be able to post as usual. We'll see......

Camera Club of New York benefit auction

A Silent Photo Auction to Benefit The Camera Club of New York

Wednesday, December 2, 6 – 8pm
Calumet Photographic, 22 West 22nd Street
(between Fifth and Sixth Avenues)

Please join us for our annual silent auction, featuring work of choice emerging photographers, vintage photographs, and exciting works by established photographers.

Participating artists: Arturo Acosta, Cara Alhadeff Judea, Erica Allen , Mariette Pathy Allen, Merry Alpern, Steve Arnold, Peter Baker, Brett Bell, Leslie Bellsey, Anita Blank, Sam Branman, Timothy Briner, David Brommer, Hunter Brown, Susan Burnstine, Christine Callahan, Eric William Carroll, Sean Carroll, Lindsey Castillo, Jesse Cesario, Jesse Chan, Megan Cump, Pradeep Dalal, Kia Davis, Emile Dubuisson, Rian Dundon, Max Dworkin, David Ebeltoft, Robert Edelman, Amy Elkins, Sean Ellingson, Smith Elliot, Lisa Elmaleh, Jon Feinstein, Hugo Fernandes, Mark Fernandes, Larry Fink, Ryan Foerster, Martine Fougeron, Allen Frame, Anders Goldfarb, Samuel Gottscho, Lorraine Gracey, Robin Graubard, Jasmine Gregory, Lori Grinker, Leonora Hamill, Marissa Herrmann, Henry Horenstein, Meng Ling Hsieh, Joelle Jensen, Charles Johnstone, Jessica M. Kaufman, Salma T. Khalil, Michelle Kloehn, Anne Lai, Erika Larsen, Leigh Ledare, Ed Lee, Sebastian Lemm, Nataly Levich, David Levinthal, Sam Levinthal, Wayne Liu, Colleen Longo, Joseph Maida, Jerome Mallman, Rochelle Marmorek, John Meyers, Dana Miller, Azikiwe Mohammed, Carolyn Monastra, Alex Morel, Santiago Mostyn, Walter Naegle, Kae Newcomb, Lori Nix, Leah Oates, Nadhar Omar, Stuart O'Sullivan, Susan Paulsen, Carissa Pelleteri, Alexander Perrelli, Michael Rauner, Saul Robbins, Francesca Romeo, Caren Rosenblatt, Lynn Saville, Robert A. Schaefer, Abigail Simon, Aaron Siskind, John Stanley, Tema Stauffer, Will Steacy, Amy Stein, Harvey Stein, Joni Sternbach, Patricia Sullivan, Arne Svenson, Diana Teeter, Lucas Thorpe, Christina Thurston, Hugo Tillman, Sally Tosti, Maki Ueno, Wilhelm Von Gloeden, Ellen Wallenstein, Eric Weeks, William Wegman, Susan Wides, Emma Wilcox, Amy Williams, Bernard Yenelouis, Shigeki Yoshida Benefit Committee: Mariette Pathy Allen, Paul Amador, Brian Clamp, Daniel Cooney, Michael Foley, Martine Fougeron, Tom Gitterman, Howard Greenberg, Peter Hay Halpert, Henry Horenstein, Michael Mazzeo, Jessica Robinson, Lynn Saville, Spencer Throckmorton $10 admission. All proceeds go to The Camera Club of New York (CCNY), a non-profit 501(c)3 arts organization that has been nurturing talented photographers since 1884. Preview works at: http://www.cameraclubny.org/2009auction.html

For further inquires, contact CCNY at info@cameraclubny.org or by phone: 212-260-9927

Please visit us at www.cameraclubny.org

Après Vue Paris Photo

Paris Photo ended its 5 day run yesterday closing on what organizers could only call a success. The halls of the Carousel du Louvre were jammed day in and day out and notable crowds gathered for the evenings of the vernissage and the finissage in which any unobstructed movement was nearly impossible. But a success for fair organizers and a successful fair for a gallery are two different things. I received diverse reports, perhaps as one might expect since not every gallery had the same caliber of work or could appeal to every sort of client. A few galleries complained of slow or indifferent sales while others claimed to have record-breaking years. Of course, neither complaint nor boast are verifiable so I will confine my thoughts to more subjective matters.

The theme this year was the Arab World and Iranian photography. In theory, I am all for this. I suspect I'm not alone in being rather under-informed when it comes to photography from this part of the world, so any effort on the part of a major art institution like Paris Photo to promote awareness and to foster dialogue is very welcome.

However the reality is, as reality always is, a little more complex. First off, the definition of what is meant by "the Arab world" is unclear at best. Certainly a culture as important and old as this has spread its influence to every corner of the earth. And in our global, "flat" world, what does geography mean to artistic output? Is Hiroshi Sugimoto a Japanese artist? Is Mona Hatoum a Lebanese artist? British? German? Palestinian? None of the above? I found taxonomic questions like these rather unaddressed by the galleries involved. Secondly, given that the definition for what what the "Arab" world describes remains hazy, I was unconvinced that there is enough distinctive work around which to build a thematic foundation. Perhaps there are, but I wasn't moved by the totality with which I was presented here.

But there were notable exceptions. Motive Gallery from the Netherlands had examples from Martine Stig's "Sisters" series. I had admired this work 3 years ago when I saw it for the first time during the FIAC show, and I continue to respect the combination of the political and the graphic in her high contrast shots of covered women. Hamburg/Beirut gallery Sfeir-Semmler had a great example of Walid Raad from his work "I Might Die Before I Get A Rifle". Hans Kraus, as one would expect, brought superb examples of 19th century work featuring Arab sitters and portraits.

I also found some unexpected pleasures in work outside of the theme category. Serge Plantureux was showcasing the work of Rossella Bellusci. I am always intrigued by work at the limits of visibility, so Ms Bellusci's explorations of blown out portraits, objects, and self-portraits caught my eye. I'll be looking to learn more about her work. Galerie Vu had some fine work focusing on the Mexican-American border by under appreciated artist Jeffrey Silverthorne. Too many have only known him for his early morgue-based work neglecting his later output. Take a look. Vu also had a fine self-portrait by Christer Strömholm. I'm pretty familiar with this artist's work, and I've never seen a self-portrait like this. Pretty great. I was completely blown away by some exquisite vintage Raoul Ubac prints at Galerie Thessa Herold. This gallery is new on my radar; I've never seen them at a fair nor heard of them. I found the contemporary work at the booth to be a mixed lot, but the Ubacs were superior in every way. I'll be curious to see more of what this gallery is about.

As I have mentioned in the past, European fairs just seem to draw bigger crowds than North American ones. I don't think this is represented in sales figures, but it I do think it represents a difference in the way culture is consumed in the two locations. Families and couples out for a weekend diversion spend hours at these fairs (FIAC, Art Paris, Paris Photo, etc.) in a way that is simply not found even in New York City. While it makes for uncomfortably packed conditions for the serious collector, I can only see it as a positive thing when looking the society as a whole. Perhaps responding to this, Reed Expositions, the organizer of Paris Photo, inaugurated a VIP morning time on every day of the fair. Instead of the usual practice of having one VIP preview a few hours earlier than the scheduled general opening, Paris Photo had a VIP-only morning period every day from 10:00-11:30. Any collector who needed some quiet face time with a gallery would find the fair at a civilized density each morning. I cannot applaud this innovation loudly enough, and I hope it was enough of a success that it will be copied by every fair on earth.

Outside of the fair, there was an exceptional surrealism show at the Pompidou Center, La Subversion des Images. If you going to Paris anytime before January 11, 2010, just plain don't miss it. I spent hours on 2 visits as did everyone I spoke to about it. It's an exciting, scholarly show that also rewards even a casual visitor. If you're not heading to Paris, the catalog has its own pleasures. It's only in French, but is still worth the $60 tariff. Amazon.com sometimes says it's out of print. Don't believe it. Pompidou bookstores had copies piled to the ceiling. There's also a soft cover bi-lingual "album" that is worth it especially if you don't speak French. Amazon.ca has plenty of copies though the album seems a little harder to find outside of the Pompidou bookstore.

An invitation and a pat on the back

I got an email a few days ago from the noted curator and writer, Marvin Heiferman. He invited me to take a look at a few new projects he's undertaken at the Smithsonian. Here's what he sent me:

click! photography changes everything (www.click.si.edu) is a provocative rethinking of photography's cultural impact that encourages site visitors to explore the ways photographic images enable us to visualize, comprehend, and interact with the world we live in.

click! features readable and informative short texts commissioned from experts, writers, inventors, public figures, and selected visitors to the website. Each text is illustrated with images chosen by project contributors and selected from the Smithsonian's vast collection of over 13 million images. Stories explore the many ways photography changes who we are, what we do, what we see, where we go, what we want, and what we remember. As digital technology is altering the form, content and transmission of camera imagery. click! photography changes everything provides a unique opportunity to reflect on the history, practice, and power of photography in the past, present, and future.

The second project, THE BIGGER PICTURE (blog.photography.si.edu), is a blog about photography and the Smithsonian. It features photographs from the Smithsonian Institution's archives, news about visual culture, and posts about photography in the digital age.

I took a look and I think it's a broad, inclusive program that deserves a look. I'll add the blog to my blog roll so you can click on the link anytime. The link for "Photography Changes Everything" is above.

On a personal note, I had a sweet little encounter this morning. I was visiting the Paris Photovintage hotel table fair looking for the odd vernacular treasure. I gave my card to the folks at AnamorFose Photo Gallery from Izegem, Belgium. Xavier, the owner, said, "I know you!". "Really? How?", I asked.
"I read your blog", was the reply. I can't tell you how much this warms my heart. My stat counter tell me that tens of people read my blog every day. To know that it is reaching a photo dealer I've never met in a Belgian town I've never heard of just makes me smile and smile. Thank you dear readers.

Lishui Photo Festival

I've been invited to participate as a nominating curator for a new photo festival in China. It starts at the end of this month in the Southern city of Lishui. I'll be spending a week there promoting the two artists I've nominated, Christian Erroi and Cornelia Hediger, and looking at the work of almost 100 other artists. The work will be a mix of Western artists brought by Western nominators and Chinese work by Chinese nominators. The website (almost entirely in Chinese) is here: http://www.lsphoto.org/syj/. Take a look. I'll file a report as soon as I'm back in mid-December.