CHINESE ARTS CENTRE.

The other day, myself and Josie thought it would be a nice idea to explore Manchester even further and so we ventured around the city centre, collecting maps and going into the tourist information centre. It was here where we discovered that there was a photography exhibition by Chen Man being displayed at the Chinese Arts Centre in the Northern Quarter, and so we thought it would be a good idea to take a look. At first, it was very hard to find, with it being such a small, remote gallery, however once we ventured inside we soon became intrigued with all the photography displayed in a small, little room. Chen Man is a photographer who plays around with the juxtaposition of old and new, real and imaginary, ordinary and idea. She uses modern city landscapes and historical buildings in China as her backdrops to her photos and mixes these with street culture, animation, science-fiction and pop references. Her images are often heavily manipulated, with complex layers of post-production. The hyper-real aesthetic of her images creates a desire for unobtainable perfection. Although this exhibition doesn't necessarily link to out project, the concept of old and new Manchester and having a backdrop in our images/samples of Manchester might be a nice thing to think about?