Art

Yesterday Jenni and I went on a date to the 798 Art District. We had been wanting to visit this place for a long time, but just never made the time to do so. So after a long bus ride on the 988 [which by the way is my LEAST favorite bus in all of Beijing - it is always crowded, and by crowded I mean literally having to be pushed onto the bus, and yesterday was no exception], a stop by the local McDonalds and a taxi ride later we found ourselves in a city within a city. Not that the Art District is that big, but it really feels like you have somehow traveled outside of Beijing, and even China for that matter. Fortunately we had anticipated that there would be lots of "artsy" foreigners in this area so we had dressed appropriately for the day.

Our first stop took us to the 798 Photo Gallery. And I must admit that I was a little nervous about how our day would go when I stepped inside and was greeted with Xiaochuan Lu's [beware, before clicking on the previous link, you have been warned] bizzare photography. I love photography, all kinds of photography, but this was just a little to strange for me. If this was any indication of what lied ahead I knew I would be sorely disappointed. Fortunately, it was not!

As we made our way upstairs we moved into the realm of semi-normalicy [digitally altered photography]. After looking at these photos we went next door and fell in love with Huang Qingjun and Ma Hongjie's "Family Stuff" series. In these Photographs various Chinese families were selected to represent the typical family in thier area. Then all their worldly posessions were taken out of their home and placed in front of their house. Finally the family is placed among their "stuff" and the photo is taken. Two photos really stood out to me:

In the background of this photo you'll notice the Chinese Character 拆 [chai] as in 拆房子 [chai fangzi]. It means to demolish a house and is an official notice by the government that one's house will be torn down. Last year we noticed that as the Olympics got closer and closer many homes were torn down, especially those near Olympic venues. I can only assume that this family had their home "chaied" because of the Olympics. It was just a very powerful photo to me!

This second photo I liked because the family pictured doesn't have a lot of material poessions but they seem so happy and proud of what they do have. We are more the the sum of our posessions!

Here is a link if you are interested in looking at more photos of "family stuff"