Twenty years ago, in one of her articles a woman writer described me as a bird on a branch. It is true --- I often dream of being a bird flying in the air, flying to any place I want to visit.? In fact, I have done it; I have been to many beautiful places in the world, like a migrating bird chasing the sun and sea, wandering around the sacred places of the civilization of humanity or the debris of history. I am also a bird sentimentally attached to my home; in the past thirty years I have spent most of my time systematically filming Shanghai's historic houses with the intention of making a visual documentary.?? I am bewildered by some lost customs and complicated stories of the past.
In the 1980s, when I filmed Shanghai from the air the greater part of the town center consisted of dark traditional houses andred-roofed shikumen (stone framed) houses in the longtang (lanes), along with some Western style houses, apartment buildings and a few tall buildings. Pudong, at that time, was criss-crossed by many rivers, with green fields and yellow rape seed flowers in blossom, a beautiful countryside view.
During the filming from the air in the 1990s, the new construction in the city had just started --- as if the city had begun to wake up --- becoming more colorful, while some old buildings were being pulled down. The Oriental Pearl TV Tower, a landmark of Pudong, had been erected, but the area around it had not yet been touched.
With the approach of the Expo in 2010, again I had the chance to film Shanghai from the air. When our helicopter flew over the wetlands of Chongming Island, the rivers and grasses reminded me of what the city center of Shanghai was like a hundred and fifty years ago. The metropolis was erected in this kind of place. When we flew to the town center we saw high rises and the beautiful and colorful buildings of different styles at the Expo. I, a man born and brought up in Shanghai, felt very surprised to see this picture. I think that only the phrase "an explosion of sights" can describe my feeling.
Quickly, I was lost in the forest of a city formed of steel, concrete and glass.? Facing the physical changes, I found it difficult to remember all I had seen.
It is true that our generation, which has been through the "Cultural Revolution" and the disorder in history, have not had time to recover ourselves, yet new changes have already begun; I feel I am living in contradiction.? Sometimes I feel that I am a lucky photographer, living in this period and this city, having recorded the changes in the city of Shanghai in just thirty years.? Sometimes I feel that I am an unlucky photographer, suffering all day long the ear-splitting noise from the worksites and the hubbub of the city. In the past twenty years I have seen with my own eyes too many old houses disappearing, together with some of the traditional ways of life of Shanghai people.
Actually, in the town center of Shanghai there was no spare land. In the 1920s and 1930s Shanghai was already full of people and buildings. The present high rises were built on the sites of old houses. The remaining shikumen houses are now being treated as precious real estate, some of those houses costing RMB120,000 per square meter after having been renovated. They seem to be expensive. However, those houses bear the duty of retaining the collective memory of the city of several generations of Shanghai people.
Not long ago, I was interviewed by a representative of the Hong Kong media. The topic was "Deke Erh witnesses the lost memory of Shanghai." This topic has been one of the themes of my work in the past thirty years. At the very least, I have published more than ten picture books which have proved to be popular. I think I am a person that knows Shanghai well. However, when I was able to fly over Shanghai again I discovered that the city I used to know well was strange to me.
Actually, I am only a strange bird (or a bird lost on its way home).
April 12, 2010
Old China Hand Press |
