Portfolio

Zhi Guang Ju ARPS

Statement of Intent

Shanghai’s ceaseless energy has given it the name “the city with no night”. My aim in these photographs is to celebrate this vitality. My technique, which includes shifting the camera while keeping the shutter pressed, enables me to “activate” the static night-time lighting of the city, making it move and dance in a symphony of colour. My inspiration is the spontaneous, real-time nature of brushwork in Chinese painting and calligraphy, and like in that discipline where the artist has one chance only to make his mark, here each photograph is a single unmodified exposure. It is my hope that these images capture something of the essence of Shanghai, and in a manner which fuses Eastern and Western approaches to the way we look at and interact with our surroundings.