 |
|
Paddyfield.com
More reviews by Wayne E. Yang
Readers may purchase reviewed books from Paddyfield.com, Asia's online bookseller.North American readers may prefer to buy US editions from Powells.com.
|
|
|
Empire: Impressions from China by James Whitlow Delano
In China's economic reemergence, it might seem that the country's sidelines are filled solely with cheerleaders. Where there is progress, there is no looking back, right? Yet there are those who do. Photographer JAMES WHITLOW DELANO too marvels at the ability of the Chinese to remake the face of their country, but he laments the rapidity of the changes, finding himself "constantly a step behind, chasing memories." He also frets about the rapaciousness of the changes. Delano once told Photo District News that he found the energy of the Chinese people "awe-inspiring," but "so is the destruction of traditional neighborhoods." In Empire: Impressions from China, Delano aims to document these changes.
While the best of photojournalism is firmly accepted as art in some circles, it remains the stepchild in others. Can it be art if it aims towards reportage, say the detractors? There is no question about Delano's work in Empire. Delano, who has made his home in Asia since the early 1990s, unabashedly claims the title of journalist, but his photographs clearly are imprinted with his artistic signature.
Delano became a journalism major in college after coming upon the photographs of Henri Cartier-Bresson, who is often called a pioneer of "street photography." Delano has also been an admirer of the gritty photodocumentary work that was commissioned by the U.S. Farm Security Administration during the drought conditions of America's "dust bowl era" of the 1930s. (Richard Pitkin, writing in B&W Magazine, credits the FSA photographers with gaining initial acceptance for photojournalism as an art form. Others credit World War II era photographers like Cornell Capa for helping photojournalism turn the corner.) Like the FSA photographers, Delano seems to have spent considerable time getting to know his subject. Colin Jacobson notes in Empire that Delano visited China more than 50 times, often for as long as five weeks at a time. Unlike many of today's equipment-laden photojournalists, though, Delano is known to carry a single Leica camera body and a 35mm lens as he searches for images. In an age that favors Adobe Photoshop and color saturation, Delano's tendencies toward soft focus, black & white film and his style of toning harken back to an earlier era of photography.
"Fortunately, Delano is part of a diminishing tribe of photographers who are still prepared to get involved, do things their own way, not wait for the phone to ring, take a stance, offer a viewpoint, and always uncertain of whether the work will ever end up being published," writes Jacobson.
Yet, though they do recall an earlier period, the photographs also have the timeless feel of great art. Marcel Saba, Delano's agent at Redux Pictures, calls the style "so surreal, so dreamlike." Delano acknowledges his debt to Cartier-Bresson and Eugene Atget. He notes how he avoids being imitative of his idols, yet we see their influence on his photography. Cartier-Bresson, of course, is known for his preaching of the need to capture "the decisive moment." James Borcoman's writing about Atget could also be used to describe Delano, where: "Surface information remains important in the work, but often is accompanied by large areas in which information is reduced or suppressed entirely." Such technique does not obscure, however, but instead heigtens: hands flutter over a veiled toddler; a peasant toils to carry a load of bricks on his back; an army of mannequins, fashionably dressed except for their bare legs, stare at a peddler moving her sugarcane down a street.
Maybe one of the photographs that best captures both Delano's theme of the confrontation between China's past and its rush to modernity--as well as his ability to heighten through suppression -- is his "Wuxingting Teahouse at Dusk." The image shows the bare, darkened outline of a Chinese roof and its curved eaves; strands of Christmas lights hang in front of our view, the bulbs sharply jutting out like barbs.
Wayne E. Yang
27/04/2005
|
Wayne E. Yang is based in New York, where he lives with his wife and two children. His web site is www.wayneyang.com. |
| |
|
