Shenhaijing Salt Well 燊海井
Salt Pan 盐场
Digital, 30.7 × 20.5 in, 2020/5/28
Zigong, my hometown, is located in southern Sichuan Province, China. I spent many vacations in Zigong when I was a child, where I had many observations and understandings of the world. I was also able to talk fluently in the Zigong dialect with the people there.
Historically, Zigong, Sichuan is famous for its richness in well salt, with a mining history spanning 2000 years. In the Qing dynasty, the well salt production in Zigong alone supplied over 1/10 of the country's needs.
This work is a record well's inheritor making salt indoors. The inheritor retains the skill of salt making and still maintainsa certain amount of salt production by ancient handicraft, a true artisan.
Coarse Salt 粗盐
Digital, 20.5 × 30.7 in, 2020/5/28
The coarse salt has a yellowish color, bulky composition, and feels like it's from natural. This led me to abandon the original shooting plan and place it in the foreground. I always hope to present the connection between objects and people, as expressed by the composition of this work.
Weight 重量
Digital, 30.7 × 20.5 in, 2020/5/28
Salt is one of the most important "physical evidence" of human civilization, and well salt is written and recorded by different individuals from generation to generation in different forms. This project uses photography as the starting point to completely record the production process of well salt. The purpose is to leave me and my generation a complete memory of Zigong well salt. Shoveling salt again and again, the connection between people and salt, cannot be tasted but can be weighted.
Elements 水火
Digital, 20.5 × 30.7 in, 2020/5/28
Between the salt-encased appliances, the palpable sound so of fire, water and salt mixing together as they did a thousand years ago set the ambiance for this photo.
Time 时间
Digital, 20.5 × 30.7 in, 2020/5/28
The scenes of ordinary daily labor, and the clock on the wall as a narrative element inadvertently appear, bringing more levels of meaning to this work. In this way, the old scenes, the new tools, the time on the wall, the accumulation of white salt in the environment, create a concise story.
Furnace 熔炉
Digital, 30.7 × 20.5 in, 2020/5/28
Amid the haze of steam and the glow of fire, the figure of the worker emerges in silence. The cracked walls and heavy wooden lids echo with the weight of time, while the body bends to the rhythm of labor. Here, water and fire are bound together, shaping a space where endurance, tradition, and survival intersect.
Pause 停顿
Digital, 30.7 × 20.5 in, 2020/5/28
After the heat and labor of the furnace, two workers sit in silence. One wipes away sweat, the other drinks from a cup, their bodies carrying the traces of toil. Between them, the empty chair becomes a quiet symbol—of absence, of pause, of the space that labor briefly yields to rest.
Bond 纽带
Digital, 30.7 × 20.5 in, 2020/5/28
In the half-light of the passage, two figures pause, their stance both casual and resolute. The air carries the residue of heat and labor, yet their presence together transforms weariness into quiet strength. Here, amid stone and timber, the moment becomes less about work than about the bond that endures within it.