Comments on: Rian Dundon – Fringe Life: Negotiating Modernity in Chinas Provincial Grey Zones https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/ burn is an online feature for emerging photographers worldwide. burn is curated by magnum photographer david alan harvey. Sat, 18 Jun 2016 11:10:18 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.4 By: Changsha https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-109159 Sun, 20 May 2012 09:44:28 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-109159 Despite what Rian Dundon’s pretentious narrative claims, the REAL Changsha is a plain, average Chinese city, hardly “on fire” as he so desperately wants us to interpret from his little art project. Anyone can take some snapshots in the bars and bus stations of ANY city across the world and manage to capture the worst of people. It’s almost laughable how hard Rian wants people to believe that he alone has discovered China’s backstreets; this kind of stuff has been on Flicker for years! What’s even more pathetic are those websites who are ignorantly helping Rian perpetuate this faux-dark side of China. Professor Gail Hershatter, Rian’s college teacher, seems to have also been duped into his money-making scheme by writing an essay. Note to Rian and other wannabe photographers: high-contrast B&W photos does not automatically make something “dark and mysterious.”

http://twoamericansinchina.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/book-about-real-changsha-is-it-really.html

]]>
By: Weekend Inspiration #10 – Photojournalism | christophziegenhardt.com https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107495 Sun, 01 Apr 2012 04:01:55 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107495 […] Afghanistan (Lightbox)Peter Hapak: Olympic Women’s Boxing Hopefuls (Lightbox)Rian Dundon: A View From Inside The Other New China (Burn)Spencer Platt: Haiti Landfills (MSNBC photo blog)Sally Ryan: Home No More (zReportage)Kate […]

]]>
By: Kristof Vadino https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107384 Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:07:40 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107384 nice essay (and not a lot of essays I find nice)

Photos which make the story for me: 2, 3, 6, 7, 12, 13, 15, 17, 19, 20, 22
I don’t see why the following are included:
1, 4, 8, 10, 11, 16: seem to be there to convey a sense of being close to the lives portrayed, but poor photographically compared to the others which some are really great pics
14: too litteral
21: cliché opposition and too litteral interpretation

As for the comments which say to like the feeling of being there close and others which say that it seems passersby…that seems superfluous critique…passersby look can be so good (Alex Webb), living with the subject can be so good (Bruce Davidson 100East Street)…it just has to be a stream…

the flowing can be beter in this essay with another selection, but close and some really great photos

]]>
By: Brian Frank https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107382 Fri, 23 Mar 2012 16:27:32 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107382 Congratulation on being published here. This really does feel like an insiders view of the group. I can see these as as snaps posted on facebook for friends to comment. Complete immersion. Wonderful stuff!

]]>
By: Carlo https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107378 Fri, 23 Mar 2012 13:47:03 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107378 At first I did not really like it. No reason, really. I don’t know why honestly.
Now it’s growing on me….
I do have to ask why black and white? I think this will work better in color.
The black and white gives it (to me) a dated look. I feel like I’m looking at pictures from the eighties not the present. It almost looses all the impact that it’s trying to portray.

This does not happen to me when I look at Gilden, Petersen or Pellegrin….

Well….anyways….it’s a fine essay and it’s great that it’s published here on Burn.

]]>
By: Jeff Hladun https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107371 Fri, 23 Mar 2012 01:01:02 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107371 Bill:

Yeah, I agree with your disagreement with John’s critique. At first I was impressed with the artist statement, and loved the photographs, but I couldn’t make the connection. Looking at Vink’s refuses, it became a little clearer. The small-town girl in Beijing, the cheap-thrill bar, the relatively lax security at the university, and the young homosexual writhing in pain/bodily fluids/booze? all helped to make it for me. Rian knows what the norm for the Western media interpretation of China is, I don’t. The other other could probably exist in Beijing, just as the youth of New York City are really no different than the teenagers of Buffalo, or Portland.

By the way, does anyone think number fourteen eerily similar to David’s photo of Andrew Wyeth climbing through the window? ;)

]]>
By: Paul https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107370 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 21:59:23 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107370 Frostfrog…

Welcome back. Nice comment, echoes many of my latest thoughts on this essay.

]]>
By: Gordon Lafleur https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107368 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 21:22:42 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107368 Frostfrog
India seems to agree with you, turns you into a poet. Love you post.

]]>
By: Frostfrog https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107367 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 21:05:36 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107367 Yes, Imantz… over-processed, gut-destroying foods – one of the many wonders of America!

]]>
By: Imants https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107366 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 20:54:02 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107366 There goes the diet back to over processed food group …………..

]]>
By: Frostfrog https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107365 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 20:22:18 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107365 I just changed my mind. I had forgotten about Filiberto’s. I am not going to get a hamburger. I am going to get a Filiberto’s burrito, with cold Pepsi to wash it down.

]]>
By: Frostfrog https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107364 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 20:17:31 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107364 Just got back to the US from India and I am listless and have a headache – but I am alone in a motel room in Mesa, Arizona, with a decent wireless connection and so finally I can sit down and take a look at this essay – in full screen mode..

I pretty much agree with everything that has been said above, including the opposing viewpoints expressed by those who vehemently disagree with each other.

Except for John Vink’s statement, which I most definitely do disagree with:

Four, 8, 11, and 14 really do need to be in this essay. When I hit four, I had to stop, to study the face of girl and wonder about her. She seemed like someone I knew, somehow. And 14 probably put more questions into my head than any other single frame in the essay. I wanted to ask the girl in 11 to dance with me, but I probably would have scared her, so it is good that I was not there to ask. Why had the youth fallen? Why? Why? Politics? Alcohol? Meth? Banana peel? I do want to know, but it is okay that Rian does not tell me, but leaves me to wonder and to draw my own non-conclusions.

This is one of those essays that tells me that no matter how different we all are, we are all same. We are all disaffected youth – even those of us who most people do not think of as youth, just because we have white beards or bald heads and grandkids. It doesn’t matter. We are youth and we are disaffected. We will remain disaffected until we are put in our graves or cast to the wind and waters – as Ryan has so well demonstrated in this fine essay.

I am going to go search for a hamburger now. I feel a little guilty about it, because I sure don’t need one and I enjoy the way all those cows in India just hang out and do whatever they want without having to worry about being made into hamburger.

Congratulations, Rian.

]]>
By: kh https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107362 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 16:56:26 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107362 beautiful work Rian !keep it up….. (stil my favorite for many reasons : Fan Bingbing and I :http://www.zonezero.com/zz/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1209&catid=2&Itemid=7&lang=en)

]]>
By: tanakak https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107359 Thu, 22 Mar 2012 15:17:20 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107359 Probably about as good as it gets for a 23-shot essay. I got the message and believe that message to be congruent with the situation. Very well done, Rian. Thank you for sharing it here.

]]>
By: Paul https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107350 Wed, 21 Mar 2012 22:01:24 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107350 I found the amount and diversity of images absolutely fascinating and it’s nice to see a long essay. The only point I would make is where is the positive side to China’s economic growth? Surely there must be good aspects.

]]>
By: Eamonn Doyle https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107341 Wed, 21 Mar 2012 11:03:53 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107341 some nice images.. although the project description is completely out of control ! :)

]]>
By: Gordon Lafleur https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107336 Tue, 20 Mar 2012 14:59:09 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107336 Jamie

Your comment won’t provoke any dissent with me. I have complained here on many occasions about the fact the negative themes you mention seem all too pervasive. Bored, no, weary, yes. It is a sad trend.

Perhaps it reflects the mind-set of young people in these times. Generation Y bother. I feel and see this attitude in my own children and their friends. They are not hopeful for the future, and hear nothing but predictions of doom for the planet and economic chaos. They party with a kind of angry abandon. There is a fatalistic “what’s the use” attitude.

Like you, while I appreciate the story being told here, I’d also love to see more of a balance, as in the dignity and humanity evident in your work.
http://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/05/jamie-maxtone-graham-when-evening-comes/

]]>
By: Imants https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107331 Tue, 20 Mar 2012 08:30:34 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107331 ps modernity has been done and dusted for some time.

]]>
By: Imants https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107330 Tue, 20 Mar 2012 03:26:45 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107330 Before anyone wants to play the historic perspective with Li’s work Rian’s is in the same mold 2008 in this case

]]>
By: Imants https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2012/03/rian-dundon-fringe-life-negotiating-modernity-in-chinas-provincial-grey-zones/#comment-107329 Tue, 20 Mar 2012 03:22:07 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=10270#comment-107329 …..as Jamie stated a bit flavour of the month feel

]]>