From Propaganda to Socially Engaged Photography

ON A CHINESE SCREEN hat can photography bring to our understanding of labour in WChina? This question needs to be addressed taking into account the role and possibilities of photography more generally, its development over time, and the history and special conditions of China. After 1949, political control over image production in China created a visual hegemony that glorified socialism and class struggle, while rendering social problems, inequalities, and injustices invisible. However, like in so many other fields, the reform period has enabled a growing and diverse group of people to challenge earlier prescribed visual aesthetics and ideological control. Photographers today experiment with new ways of documenting Chinese society, and also address hitherto invisible issues as well as new problems. Economic and social reforms have created new types of workers, for instance migrant workers, more precarious Portrait of miner Yang labour conditions, for example in factories in Guanlan in Shandong, the South and in private mines, and new forms by Song Chao. of marginalisation and exploitation, such as illegal work within the sex industry. Visualising These socioeconomic developments have drawn the attention of domestic and foreign Labour and photographers alike, such as Edward Burtynsky, working on Chinese topics like the steel and Labourscapes coal industries, manufacturing, shipyards, recycling, and the Three Gorges Dam, and in China Sim Chi Yin, working on issues such as gold From Propaganda to Socially miners and migrant workers (Estrin 2015). Engaged Photography Digital photography, the Internet, social media platforms, and the expansion of smartphones, not only have provided professional Marina SVENSSON photographers with new possibilities, but they also have enabled ordinary Chinese citizens and workers to document their lives and Photography has always been a powerful circulate these images online. Today a wide tool to depict the lives of workers in China. range of photography tackling social problems Whereas during the Mao period political and labour conditions can be seen on the control over image production created a visual Internet, in art spaces, as well as on social media hegemony that glorified socialism and class platforms. If, as the filmmaker Wim Wenders struggle, more recent digital developments (quoted in Levi Strauss 2003, 1) argues, ‘the have enabled ordinary Chinese citizens and most political decision you make is where you workers to document their lives and circulate direct people’s eyes,’ China indeed has gone these images online. through a visual revolution challenging the 132 MADE IN CHINA YEARBOOK 2018 ON A CHINESE SCREEN political gaze and visual hegemony. This being the Farm Security Administration to document said, however, the Chinese Communist Party the causes and consequences of agricultural (CCP) still maintains a strong interest in—and intensification and exploitative factory the means to—control and censor both the farming. A more recent example is Sebastiâo written word and images. Salgado, who started out as an economist but In such a context, this essay discusses how in the late 1970s decided to devote himself to photography can serve a twofold purpose, as photography in the belief that it could be more both a valuable historical record that helps powerful than pure academic work. While us understand how ideology and politics have Salgado has been criticised for aestheticising shaped images of labour and the working suffering, he has also been widely defended class in China, and as an important affective and praised, and in 2010 he was awarded the and intellectual tool to analyse current labour American Sociological Association Award for issues. Excellence in the Reporting of Social Issues. Salgado maintains a strong belief in the power of photography to give rise to debate and Photography, Social action: ‘What I want is the world to remember the problems and the people I photograph. Engagement, and Calls What I want is to create a discussion about for Change what is happening around the world and to provoke some debate with these pictures (Salgado 1994).’ In the West, photography has long been However, the increasing accessibility regarded as a tool to create awareness of of photographs has created its own set of social problems, injustices, inequalities, and challenges. Already in 1974, W. Eugene Smith— the life and struggles of marginalised groups who, among other things, is famous for his of people (Bogre 2012; Franklin 2016; Levi photographs of the victims of the Minamata Strauss 2003). Since the late-nineteenth mercury scandal in Japan—expressed century, documentary photography and awareness of how the sheer number of photojournalism have addressed topics photographs can numb people, although he such as slum housing, landlessness, child ultimately held the view that photography can labour, poor working conditions, poverty, and be an important tool for critical thinking. In his migration. Socially engaged photographers and words: ‘Photography is a small voice at best. photojournalists have on their own accord or Daily, we are deluged with photography at its in collaboration with scholars and civil society worst, until its drone of superficiality threatens actors—including news media, photo agencies, to numb our sensitivity to all images. Then and NGOs—documented and uncovered social why photograph? Because sometimes—just and political problems with the aim to create sometimes—photographs can lure our senses awareness and support for social and political into greater awareness. Much depends on the change. viewer; but to some, photographs can demand In the field of documentary photography enough of emotions to be a catalyst to thinking’ on labour issues, one of the earliest and most (quoted in Franklin 2016, 201). This emotional well-known photographers is Lewis W. Hine, or affective quality of photography is also the who in 1908 was commissioned by the United reason why so many NGOs and activists today States National Child Labor Committee to make use of photography in their work. document child labour in the country. Another As a result of the digital revolution, we are example is Dorothea Lange, who during the today surrounded by ever more images that American depression in the 1930s, together compete for our attention, and thus visibility with the economist Paul Taylor, worked for remains a question of politics and power MADE IN CHINA YEARBOOK 2018 133 ON A CHINESE SCREEN relations. Susan Sontag (2003) has argued that Migrant workers taking a rest in a factory in the proliferation of images of violence and Dongguan, by Zhan Youbing. pain can result in ‘compassion fatigue’ that undermines our abilities to feel, connect, and act. Images may thus hinder, rather than foster, The proper role of photography from the action and solidarity, creating a distance that perspective of the CCP was laid down in prevents connectivity and civic engagement. different speeches and directives, which Other scholars and photographers have came to inform Chinese photojournalism in challenged her conclusion, however, and believe the three decades that preceded the reforms. that photography can still play an important Photographers were called upon to show role in awareness raising, civic engagement, the progress and success of communism and humanitarian and political activism (Bogre by documenting technical advances, new 2012; Franklin 2016; Levi Strauss 2003). One factories, and large infrastructural projects. needs to distinguish between images that play It was not possible to take and publish on people’s sense of guilt and give rise to pity, photographs that hinted at social problems, charity, and good-will, and images that provoke hardships, or resentments, as this would have outrage and call for more radical social and been seen as a critique of the political system. political changes. Moreover, one also needs For this reason, photographs of the Great to distinguish between images that portray Famine of the early 1960s do not exist, but people as victims and images that portray them there are ample photographs celebrating the with dignity and agency. Great Leap Forward and its advances in steel production. In the photographs of the 1950s and 1960s, workers are depicted as heroic and From Visual Hegemony strong, toiling to build the New Socialist China with commitment and revolutionary fervour. to New Visualities They are physically sturdy, well-dressed and clean-faced, and engage in difficult work The CCP understood early on that without flinching. The photographs portray photography can be useful in ideological the strength and collective spirit of the working work and serve as a propaganda tool (see, class without hinting at any difficulties or poor for instance, Roberts 2013 and Wu 2017). working conditions. 134 MADE IN CHINA YEARBOOK 2018 ON A CHINESE SCREEN Private mine in Henan province in the 1990s, by Zhang Xinmin (who was among the first to Niu Guozheng. document migrant workers in Guangdong in the early 1990s), Nie Guozheng (who has documented the life of miners), and Lu Guang With the end of the Cultural Revolution (famous for his work on the Henan HIV crisis and the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, the role and environmental pollution) have addressed and content of photography began to change. topics and groups of people that previously Photojournalists were inspired by the shifting received scant attention. Many NGOs—Project ideological and cultural landscape, and began Hope working on rural education was one of the to experiment with new aesthetics, resulting first—also began to make use of photography in the appearance of a new humanitarian to draw attention to their work. The digital realism in photojournalism. At the same time, revolution, including the Internet, social media new artistic uses of photography—inspired platforms, and smartphones, has enabled more in part by the influx of the works of Western people to document their lives and personal photographers—appeared, while family memories. On social media, especially Sina photography became less political and more Weibo, Chinese citizens have been exposed to individualistic in character.

Load more