The Lianzhou Festival just opened. We are presenting a selection of works featured by Chinese photographers and a Festival overview by Michel Philippot:
The International Photo Festival of Lianzhou is celebrating its seventh edition. For the Festival, it is a coming of age. Last year, the same Festival questioned “The world, is it real?” For the most part, participating photographers responded affirmatively. This year’s Festival organizers have chosen to reflect on the changing nature of Chinese society with “Towards the social Landscape”. China is undergoing a veritable revolution, social and geographical landscapes are changing rapidly from week to week. The photographs presented offer a documentary and subjective glimpse into this atmosphere, evoking the effects of time and space. This theme was originally presented at the “George Eastman Kodak House” of Rochester in 1966. In 1967, a major exhibition at New York’s MoMA curated by John Swarkowski with the same title “Towards the social Landscape” featured works by the initiators of the “New Documentary Photography” movement, Lee Friedlandler, Gary Winogrand, Diane Arbus. Given the number, the quality and the variety of projects undertaken by Chinese photographers about their changing environment, Lianzhou Festival director, Duan Yuting, decided, with modesty and humility, to hang their works in Lianzhou.
Michel Philippot
