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The photos themselves are environmental portraits, shot large and detailed and printed luxuriously large by Epson's big machines (the gallery, is, after all, a sales space — one of the printers was parked in a corner). Jiang Jian has travelled through his regional countryside, photographing the poorest of farmers and their families in their homes. They are posed, shown no doubt as they themselves would like to appear, with their favorite goods in their favorite corner of home — the worn Mao figurines, the photos carefully torn from each month of a calendar and pasted to the walls, the newspaper clippings and car racing posters. A bit like some mad combination of Bill Owens Suburbia with Bee's meticulous post-soviet interiors, made possible by the relectless detail of the photos. The scale gives the subjects substance and immediacy — it's not possible to dismiss these people as simply "poor" or "charming" or any other convenient social catchall. Each person demands their own identity, and their environments each tell a detailed and captivating personal story. This is fantastic work and one has to wonder if it will reach a wider audience than the priveleged few in central Beijing, circa 2004.
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