Tuesday 12 February 2013

Mathias Braschler/Monika Fischer : The China Project



I noticed the work of Swiss photographers Mathias Braschler and Monika Fischer in the always-interesting The New York Times LENS blog (co-edited by James Estrin). This time their work is of epic scope since it involved going to China on a road trip to visit its 33 provinces and regions to make portraits of the people.

The result is The China Project. The project includes notes made during the trip: a sort of blog entry for every city and town where the portraits were made.

The duo traveled across China, got arrested a few times and lugged a a 4x5 camera with a flash, and soft box to make the portraits. The portraits are of yak farmers, gynecologists, television personalities, village chiefs, singing gondoliers, prostitutes, aging revolutionaries, circus stars, bank employees, beggars and trash collectors.

I recalled having featured the work of these two talented photographers in a 2009 blog post relating to their similar work on climate change, and which was shown in Vanity Fair magazine.

REI | De Las Flores

REI by Tewfic El-Sawy on on Exposure