171 years ago, the creation of photography enabled humankind to record history in a more direct, vivid and credible way than writing and drawing. Photography was introduced to China in 1844, when China was opened up by the armed-to-the-teeth Western powers after the first Opium War. On September 13, 1876, the Qing Dynasty government and Britain signed the Sino-UK Yantai Treaty, in which Wenzhou was opened up as a commercial port. In April of the following year, Britain set up the consulate in Wenzhou, and simultaneously the Kangkesite passenger-cargo ship of the British Jardine Matheson opened the Shanghai – Wenzhou – Fuzhou route. Although Wenzhou was opened up earlier than other similar domestic cities, unfortunately photographs about Wenzhou's history are actually scarce. This is probably because Wenzhou was situated in a remote corner with inconvenient transportation, and because photography spread too late into Wenzhou and was not applied extensively. As a result, when we are looking back and trying to understand Wenzhou's history, we can't help but feel that it's a pity that so little photographs remain today.
Mr. Du Shao (1910 - 1970), born in Yongqiang, Wenzhou (now Longwan District), Zhejiang Province, is a renowned photographer of the older generation in Wenzhou. Extremely passionate about the art of photography, at the age of 13 he entered the Aiwu Photo Studio in Wenzhou and started to study photography. He continued taking photos until the year preceding his death, when he was seriously ill at the hospital and had no choice but to put down the camera. During his life, he produced a massive amount of photographic works and left behind more than 1000 black and white negatives, including nearly 300 pieces of documentary records. So far, in Wenzhou we have not yet discovered anyone else besides Mr. Du Shao who has such an amount of photographs recording Wenzhou's significant historical events, the distinctive rural charm it had, and Wenzhou's culture and humanities in 1930s and 1940s. This makes this set of documentary works even more precious and accounts for the reason why we put together and published this album.
So far, in Wenzhou we have not yet discovered anyone else besides Mr. Du Shao who has such an amount of photographs recording Wenzhou's significant historical events, the distinctive rural charm it had, and Wenzhou's culture and humanities in 1930s and 1940s.
Before editing this collection, we had only known of and appreciated Mr. Du Shao's black and white photographs of the traditional Chinese painting style and knew that he had attainted incredibly artistry in countryside scenery photography. We did not expect to find that he had also photographed and preserved many pictures capturing historical events that happened in Wenzhou, which made it possible today for us to more vividly and deeply understand Wenzhou's history and humanities. This should be regarded as a great blessing to Wenzhou's cultural history.
Perhaps the most stunning and moving of Mr. Du Shao's documentary photographic works was a set of pictures taken after the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, named "Wenzhou's Preparation of All Sorts Under Enemy Airplanes and Warship Threat (Situation after the Bombing)." Published in the Hong Kong Liangyou Pictorial, these pictures caused a considerable stir among people all over China. The following year, the Earth Pictorial, another pictorial press in Hong Kong, sent a letter of appointment to Du Shao, inviting him to become a special photojournalist, a position that Mr. Du Shao was the first to take in Wenzhou's photographic history. In the group photos "Wenzhou's Preparation of All Sorts Under Enemy Airplanes and Warship Threat (Situation after the Bombing)," an especially eyecatching picture depicts the circumstances during enemy airplane raids, showing the residents scattering, startled and panicked, in all directions to seek shelters on the street before the Wenzhou Mansion. The picture was taken from the second floor of the photo studio where he worked. We may conclude from this that when the air defense warning suddenly sounded, Mr. Du Shao did not first think of his own safety, but instead immediately took out his camera to capture the Japanese forces' invasion of Wenzhou. This act displays Mr. Shao's intense sense of social responsibility and his deep regard for justice that were unwaverable even when his own safety was at risk. According to Mr. Jiaye Shao, the son of Mr. Du Shao and former Wenzhou Photographer Association president and renowned photographer, his mother told him that during the entire process of the Japanese bombing in Wenzhou, his father had taken that very old Germany-made Fletcher Aaron 120 camera and darted here and there outside, taking photos all the while. Mr. Du Shao hadn't hidden in the air-raid shelter or dugout, which made his wife extremely concerned. During the Japanese forces' air raids, Mr. Du Shao photographed the burning private residences, street craters, destroyed building blocks, and so on, recording the crimes committed by the Japanese onto the film. At that special time, Mr. Du Shao was not only an ordinary cameraman, but a soldier bravely combating the Japanese invaders with his camera as his weapon.
At that special time, Mr. Du Shao was not only an ordinary cameraman, but a soldier bravely combating the Japanese invaders with his camera as his weapon.
Out of Mr. Du Shao's works, the majority are photos of landscapes, and as a result the Chinese photographic community always considered Mr. Du Shao to be mainly a rural landscape photographer. His scenery photographs are mostly based on the landscapes and humanities in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, capturing the mountains, rivers, pastures, and other sceneries and people there. In Mr. Du Shao's era, Mr. Lang Jingshan was also a pioneer in his scenery photography of the traditional Chinese painting-like style and enjoyed significant popularity in China. We may see that Mr. Shao's works do sometimes pursue aesthetics, but he still considerably put emphasis on recording events. Just like what Gu Zheng, professor and postgraduate candidate instructor in Fudan University, said about Mr. Shao's works: "The pictures are neat; the subjects are clear; what is engraved in negatives and films are true scenes captured from life and reality, unlike Pictorial Photographs that extensively process the pictures and try to produce images from imagination, separate from reality." These documentary pictures were selected to be part of this collection.
The progress of Wenzhou's society inevitably brings enormous changes to the surrounding landscapes, something that Mr. Du Shao's documentary photographs evidence. Take, for example, a picture taken in 1942 illustrating the Shuixin River in Wenzhou. In the photo, a simple wooden bridge crosses the river bank with two large trees standing at the bridgehead; the ground and the bridge floor are covered with thick snow; there are two pedestrians: one is holding an umbrella, and the other is warming their hands in their sleeves while hurrying past; and low trees and a few houses can be seen faintly in the distance. The author gives this picture a very poetic name - "Homecoming During a Snowy Night." The present Shuixin has turned out to be a part of a lively urban city, and there are no such sceneries to be seen there today. Another picture, "Cloud across the Jiushan River and Home in Sight," taken in 1931, depicts a version of the Jiushan river completely different from what the river is like today. At that time, the Jiushan river was vast with a high earth dam and the city wall by the riverside. Seen from a picture taken in the 1930s, the Jiangxin islet was very small - being only about 1/6 of the present size - and did not have the Xi Yuan area yet. During the 80 years from then to the present, huge changes have taken place as a result of the silt deposited by the billowing Oujiang River, which has expanded the area of the Jiangxin islet by about 5 times its original size.
The progress of Wenzhou's society inevitably brings enormous changes to the surrounding landscapes, something that Mr. Du Shao's documentary photographs evidence.
From when Mr. Shao started to learn photography at the age of 13 until the time he transferred his photo studio in the 1950s, he made a living and supported his family financially mainly through portrait photography. We had hoped to collect this part of his works since portraits provide an excellent opportunity for us to take a glance at the changes happening in society. However, in the past, the negatives were usually all returned to customers, so we are unable to gather up the portrait photographs as they have been dispersed among many people. We can only select some pictures of his families taken and kept by Mr. Shao as a supplement.
Living in a poor family, Mr. Shao led a simple and plain life. Even though he ran his own photo studio, it was barely enough to make ends meet. At that time, films were luxury items and the price was very high. To save money, Mr. Shao asked friends in Shanghai to buy large-sized, low-cost films used in the aviation photography. Then, in the darkroom, he cut these films to sizes small enough to fit suitably into his Fletcher Aaron 120 type camera. In 1949, Mr. Shao transferred his photo studio to his brother and moved his family from downtown to the suburbs, focusing on photographic creation wholeheartedly.
Mr. Shao's photographic creation stretches across 40 years, and nearly 50 years since his death, we are regretful that of more than 1000 set of works preserved by Mr. Shao, many have no accompanying descriptions, thus affecting the interpretation of these historical works. For instance, the picture about Japanese bombing in Wenzhou published in the Hong Kong Liangyou Pictorial has only the title and a concise time stamp labeling only the year without indicating a specific date. From 1938 to 1942, the Japanese forces bombed Wenzhou several times. It remains unknown whether this set of pictures is a record of a one-time bombing or a combination of several bombings. The same is true for the picture showing the troops of the Wenzhou National Government Army undergoing inspection; when looking at the photo, viewers surely have many questions: why was such a military parade held? What was the purpose? How many participants were there? Was this during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression? And so on. When we analyze this photo, we see that Mr. Shao must have been invited or assigned to this photographing task by the government - there surely is some interesting story behind it. Yet nothing about the picture is told but a general indication of the photographing time (the 1930s). The group pictures about Yongjia granary, again, leaves behind only the title - "Farmers Turn In Grain" - and the age - "the 30s." The picture shows many people delivering the grain. On the granary wall, slogans like "Abundant grain and large forces," "Money or energy, give whatever you have to help" are written. We are left wondering why the farmers were so enthusiastic to hand over their grain at that time. Was it because people shared a common hatred against the Japanese invaders during the war? It is a pity that we have no way to know the answers.
In brief, if this "Du Shao – the Old Wenzhou Album" had been edited before his death, we may have been able to obtain the full and accurate historical data, making a more plentiful and readable collection with higher reference value. However, this is only luxurious fantasy, because in Shao's final years, he encountered enormous difficulty in photographic creation, let alone in publishing the collection. According to Mr. Jiaye Shao, Mr. Du Shao's photographic creation had to be done covertly when the Great Cultural Revolution started in 1966. In the hard times, he took off the original outer casing of the camera and made a covering with strawboard to disguise it instead. He dared to take out the camera only when there was nobody or few people around.
According to Mr. Jiaye Shao, Mr. Du Shao's photographic creation had to be done covertly when the Great Cultural Revolution started in 1966.
Therefore, we should give the credit to Mr. Jiaye Shao because it is he who preserved Mr. Shao's works till today. Watching the storm of the Great Cultural Revolution get stronger and stronger, Mr. Du Shao became worried that the Red Guards would confiscate or destroy his family's properties one day, thus wiping out his precious photographic works in a moment. That was a possibility because some of his documentary photographs had involved the military and office work of the Kuomintang Government. He would possibly be imprisoned if these photos were discovered at the time. Therefore, in the risk of being implicated if found out, Mr. Jiaye Shao moved his father's negatives and published photographs to his photo studio garret bit by bit, thus protecting and preserving this set of precious inheritances.
It wasn't until 1985, after the Great Cultural Revolution had ended, that Mr. Shao's photographic achievement was rightly identified and praised. That summer, the Chinese Photographer Association Zhejiang Branch conducted the "Mr. Du Shao's Posthumous Photography Exhibition" in Hangzhou. Afterwards, specialized photographic magazines like the "Chinese Photography," "Populace Photography" and so on in addition to Zhejiang's and Wenzhou's media each published more detailed articles about Mr. Du Shao.
Rigorous, simple and brave in personality, Mr. Du Shao leaves behind more than 1000 pieces of photographs, a big part of which has not been published. These pictures are Wenzhou's precious cultural wealth. Since this year sees the centenary of Mr. Du Shao's birth, Jiaye Shao and his son, professor Dalang Shao, dean of the College of Arts, Zhejiang University of Finance & Economics, have started to sort out Mr. Du Shao's posthumous works carefully since last year. The father and son have taken painstaking efforts, sorted out and enlarged more than 200 pieces of photographs, hoping that the published collection will console Mr. Du Shao's soul in heaven.
Learning of the Shaos' desire, the Wenzhou Photographer Association launched preparatory work immediately because they believed that this would be greatly beneficial to Wenzhou's culture and the photographic cause. With the vigorous support of the Wenzhou Federation of Literary and Arts Circle, more than 150 pictures are finally edited into this "Du Shao – the Old Wenzhou Album," making it possible to learn about Wenzhou history through vivid visual imagery.
September 2010 at Wenzhou