Phantasmagoria ___Recent photographs by Miao Xiaochun　　　 Wu Hung
　

　　The centerpiece of this exhibition is an eight-meter-long photograph showing a panorama of Wuxi (Mirage). One of Miao Xiaochun’s latest works, it was taken at the top of Huishan -- a famous hill in this ancient city in southeast China. A viewer of the picture can still spot some traditional buildings here and there. But his view is dominated by a sea of skeleton-like high rises, most of which have only emerged in the past few years. It is this abrupt transformation of the city that has inspired Miao Xiaochun to title the photograph Haishi shenlou, literally “a city in the ocean with pavilions made of seashells.” As he explains in the interview attached to this short introduction:
　　“It seems that all those modern buildings you see from the hilltop shouldn’t be there, but they’ve suddenly emerged before your eyes, like a mirage in the ocean or desert. I use the phrase haishi shenlou to indicate the seemingly surreal feeling of such modern architecture in the East.”
　　To Miao, a native of Wuxi who spent his childhood in the neighborhoods at the foot of Huishan, such a “surreal feeling” is acute and personal. Again as he says in the interview, he painted Wuxi from the same hilltop even when he was in elementary school, and many places around Huishan are fused with his memories of the city. Indeed, a considerable number of photographs in this exhibition focus on these places, including the municipal zoo (Fly), a statue of Confucius (Another Time), and a huge smokestack left from the Maoist era (Towering). These places became landmarks and acquired their identities at different historical moments. As they coexist with one another and also with the newly emerging high rises in Haishi shenlou, the photograph represents a city that is profoundly heterogeneous -- a spectacle comprised of fragmentary elements and characterized by constant historical discontinuity. Fantastic yet disturbing, this cityscape has inspired me to call this exhibition Phantasmagoria, which the American Heritage Dictionary defines in three interrelated senses: 1) a