zhu yunwei : portraits. I took two pictures for each person; one with opened eyes, the other with closed eyes


zhu yunwei: portraits


'this collection of photographs are taken from a project
I completed last semester: 'black and white / dark and light'.
under the tuition of prof. hansjerg maier-aichen.

at the beginning, I planned to do some very basic experiments
to convey some common emotions. me, a young chinese student,
who'd just arrived in a completely different country, experienced
some strong, deep cultural conflicts. living overseas resulted in
the different way of thinking for me whilst working on this project.
(a common theme expressed in artworks by other chinese artists
such as xu bing or miao xiaochun.)

I’m also interested in the 'everyday' people and day-to-day life,
- common things that have a complicated inconsistency.
in my works, I show two entirely incompatible states at the same
time two states of consciousness. I believe these basic states
are just like the simple contrasts - black and white. I chose the
portrait format. the face is the most direct and basic element /
inter-medium of human expression. expressions such as laughter
have a universal meaning and are metaphorical all over the world.
I have taken many pictures of different people in the studio at
my college. these people are of different ages, different backgrounds
and countries of origin. it is an ongoing project, as there are many
expressions I'd still like to capture.

opened / closed eyes
each portrait consists of two portrait shots.
I took two pictures of each person - one with opened eyes,
the other with closed eyes. I then integrated the two pictures into
one portrait, resulting in the calm but unnatural expressions
seen here. human beings wake up and open their eyes in the
morning, close their eyes and fall asleep at night, these are which
the two normal states of everyone.



about me
zhu yunwei, born in 1982 in handan, china.
at age of 9, I moved to beijing with my parents.
since 2006, I study product design at the staatliche
hochschule fuer gestaltung / university of design,
karlsruhe, germany.


zhu yunwei, self portrait


african boy




shan




aki




paci




peter




laura




chinese girl




zhong nv




chinese girl




siewertt




katerina




krisdorf




herr pang









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