‘In many parts of China mirrors are placed outside the house to frighten away evil spirits… Mass production of mirrors in the early 20th C. reinforced cosmological conceptions, and mirrors were placed in many different settings to help improve the flow of energy and money, and keep a confined space from becoming dead and stagnant.’
‘Exotic Commodities,‘ Frank Dikotter, pub. 2007
Couchman has been making work about changing landscapes in various places for many years. Since working in Beijing, her practice has often focused upon exploring scale in her images and the mix of old and new she sees around her. She has used printmaking, drawing, photography and installation to communicate these ideas.
Beijing is a huge city in flux, a city that is constantly changing at a rapid pace. Couchman is curious to know what these changes mean to its inhabitants but also to ‘touch’ what it looks like. Recently, she has been working around the perimeter of a new development, in the hutong lanes near Gulou, the city’s historic Drum and Bell Tower Square, on the edges of what has now been permanently removed. This new photographic series seeks the texture and the vistas of the hutongs that have undergone this process of destruction. As Couchman says, the project aims, “to explore what I can see of the land – literally the earth and fabric of the city. It has a performative angle: process, construction, dirt, proximity and distance are all evident in these images. This is what I am working with.”
Couchman has headed out into the streets armed with a camera and three mirrors. The mirrors are used to fuse the different elements of the photographed scenes, both material and immaterial. The result is not the illusion of a cityscape but rather an intimate yet distant exploration of the fabric, and texture of a city whose detail as well as vistas are in flux.
在北京
北京是一个处于不断变化中的巨型城市，一个以快节奏不断变化的城市。Couchman所好奇的，不仅是这些变化对北京居民的意义，而且是去“触碰”这个城市表面看起来的样子。2011年，她曾在鼓楼附近的胡同巷子里，一处新开发地区的周界工作，也就位于市内具有历史意义的钟鼓楼广场附近，其边缘地区如今已被永久性地拆除了。这一摄影系列探寻着胡同的结构与街景，历经着这一拆除破坏的过程。
Couchman带着一架相机和三面镜子，就走进了北京的大街小巷。镜子是用来融合拍摄场景中的各种不同元素，包括有形和无形的。拍摄出来的并非是一个城市景观的幻影，而是对城市结构与实质的一种既亲近又疏远的探索，体现出这个城市的细节与风光都处在不断变化的状态中。