Homes for the People / Kunshan, China
”Homes for the People” refers to Dan Grahams photographic series ”Homes for America” (1966-67) that reflects on the newly built single family houses constituting the suburbs as a new form of urban living.
Kunshan is not far from Shanghai and denotes both the city and the province.
My photograhic series Homes for the People refers to Dan Grahams famous photographic series Homes for America (1966-67), that reflects on the newly built single family houses constituting the suburbs as a new form of urban living.
All images derive from two longer journeys to China in 2014, that brought me to different parts of the country. The speed as well as the self-indulgence with which the previous things are being destroyed and new ones built in China, combined with the fearless use of borrowed architectural elements, impressed and shocked me in equal measures.
The knitting pattern is similar in the different places. New settlements are usually planned in units of hundreds of thousands. The streets are dimensioned in such a way that they can accommodate the expected traffic in 10-15 years. – Until then, everything looks pretty empty. Shops, malls and schools are usually included. Also the fence and the barred access. Companies settle around this area and set up their factories.