Dead Fountains
Water fountains are built at high cost, token beautifying structures in the modern changing landscape of Chinese cities, representing diluted historical and religious beliefs where water represents contemplation, calmness, consideration, observation and reflection.
These represented characteristics could actually be seen as contrasts to what these Dead Fountains (2012-2013) become when they break down, are left unmaintained, or simply left empty because of poor locations and there is no-one to appreciate them.
It is also when these broken referents of cultural links are seen as the metaphor for the speed at which China is changing, losing respect for land and natural resources, but ultimately also could stand for the loss of respect for each other and the self, since the shift of growth, fuelled by consumerism, and a veneer of face-value success, consumes that which respect is lost for.
On many levels, Dead Fountains as body of work is a metaphor for the loss the Chinese (and the world) are facing, and where we are moving towards.
These represented characteristics could actually be seen as contrasts to what these Dead Fountains (2012-2013) become when they break down, are left unmaintained, or simply left empty because of poor locations and there is no-one to appreciate them.
It is also when these broken referents of cultural links are seen as the metaphor for the speed at which China is changing, losing respect for land and natural resources, but ultimately also could stand for the loss of respect for each other and the self, since the shift of growth, fuelled by consumerism, and a veneer of face-value success, consumes that which respect is lost for.
On many levels, Dead Fountains as body of work is a metaphor for the loss the Chinese (and the world) are facing, and where we are moving towards.
Dead Fountains is presented as a grid photographic print.