comrades – portraits of the LGBT in shanghai, China

COMRADES

Comrades, a set of photographic portraits, invites the viewer to come face to face with the gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, and trans-gendered men and women of Shanghai. The subjects are shown in decontextualized space, their personal stories withheld. Together, they are rendered uniform and anonymous; yet, each face contains a distinct reading. Comrades raises questions of individuality vs. collectivity, personal identity vs. social identity, and the private vs. the open.

“同志”,一组肖像摄影,使观众与来自上海的男同性恋 者、女同性恋者、双性恋者与跨性别者面面相观。 “同志”的主题在独立于情境的空间中展示出来,个人的故 事则被隐而不露。这些照片放在一起时,呈现的是这一 群体的一致性和匿名性;然而,分开看,群体中的每张 脸孔又是鲜明的,独特的。 “同志”引发的是个人与集体,私人身份与社会身份以及隐 晦与公开的问题。

The full portfolio is also online on the website :  http://timfranco.photoshelter.com/gallery/comrades/G0000Mkn67Kb5VUo/

Comrades | a portrait project about the LGBT community in CHina

As an ongoing portrait project, I am still looking for people from the LGBT community in Shanghai to finish this work. Please contact  me directly if you are interested in participating.

Contact here

forced out / series online

I have worked a few weeks following the final destruction of the district of Dongjiadu, located in Shanghai between the bund and the puxi side of the world expo. This small traditional / market district has been destroyed to lead the place to high rise commercial and apartment building, most of the people are being relocated. Some of them accept the terms, other resists and their faith is very unequal.

Please find the full series here

I am submitting this work to a few documentary magazine and hope to get it published.