Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments

This photo series documents 50 Chinese and foreign tourists while having their own photographs taken on the Circular Mound Altar within the Temple of Heaven Complex in Beijing. The work draws attention to relationships between the moment, the monument and the memento. It is a thinking on the connection people have with their monuments—both strangers and locals, and the way a monument’s meaning is reshuffled over time.

Built in 1530 the site was originally an altar for emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties to offer heavenly sacrifices. Succeeding dynasties adapted it making alterations for their own purposes. At the outset of the Cultural Revolution it was off limits as a symbol of the decadent past. In 1961 it was placed under state protection as one of China's key historical relics. It is now a historical relic and tourist attraction. The meaning and purpose of this monument unfolds as a work in progress, modified and manipulated by the needs of different societies. The same stone that was once used to make sacrifices is now used to compose photographs for the mantelpiece. Today, the brochures, maps, and information signs within the complex attempt to reconstruct something of a time people know little about. Now its function is presented as imagined—and through the virtual and corporeal photo engagements visitors make with the monument its meaning is simultaneously conjured and suppressed.


Links

Catalogue essay by Blair French

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist

Tourist Monuments

Tourist Monuments
Title: Tourist Monuments
Year: (1998 - 2001)
Media: C - Type print on aluminium
30x20 cm
Image courtesy of artist