I is for Images

I intended to write about children's book illustrators for my Alphabe-Thursday "I" post. But yesterday while exploring a nearby antiquities market, I was inspired by the intriguing images I found there to go in another direction....

As I looked through old art magazines, mostly from the 70's & 80's, I began to wonder what the images we publicly put forward communicate about our country at any given period of time?

These color images came from MeiShu 美术 25 January 1978 issue.

The artists' names are included on the print.

I also found some delightful copies of ink block (or woodblock) prints. Incidentally, this form of art, requiring a block of wood to be chiseled in relief mosaic, originated in China. The images are clean and, in general, joyful. Each carefully crafted with intention. As you examine them, see if you can interpret the impression and information, the print was intended to give.

The above prints came from a lovely soft bound book called HeiBaiMuKeJi 黑白木刻 (1 May, 1975, ShangHai). Again, the artists' names are included on the print.

BanHuaYiShu Vol 12, 1983

Aren't they incredible?! As I was leaving, I inquired off-hand whether the shop owner had any old photos.... He did, and I found some sweet pictures that seemed to date from the 1960's. While flipping through the remains of old photo albums and scanning stacks of miscellaneous images, I felt curious about the lives and personalities of the faces I saw before me. What were their hopes and dreams, their joys and sorrows, how did everything turn out for them? In innocence or infamy? Or events inconceivable to my western culture and thought. The intricacies of each life story being so precious and yet, in this case, hidden to me.


Quite unconsciously, I began to wonder what will happen to the images I am capturing and cherishing today? Will they some day end up in a dusty, old shop full of comic books and other ephemera, with a totally unconnected individual imagining what our lives were like? Or will they find a home in the hearts of future generations that will deem them and our life stories worth treasuring.

Please visit Jenny Matlock at ...off on my tangent... to check out these insightful "I" posts.