Qingjun Huang

Main Gallery

Artist Statement:

Standing in the Da-Xing-an-Ling snowfield, my thoughts seem frozen with the ice and snow. The chaotic world doesn’t exist any more, the steam locomotive running on the 2 rust-red tracks is becoming clearer and clearer with the silver snow as a backdrop.

Steam locomotives made a deep impression on me when I was a child. When I first saw this huge monster spouting smoke and flame, I was so frightened I ran into my mother’s arms. My mother told me it was a steam train named “Mao Zedong”, which could take us to my grandma’s house and the outside world. I immediately forgot the fear, and a great respect for this dark iron monster arose in my young heart. At time passed, steam locomotives gradually left the historical stage. Traveling back and forth on modern diesel trains, I slowly forgot the powerful effect of these great machines, which I used to admire so much. In early 1997, as a professional photographer, I went to Peony River city in Hei-Long-Jiang province to take photographs. I happened to discover a very old narrow-gauge railway on the left hand side of the highway. I thought the railway was abandoned, however, I was told that this was a small railway used to carry timber from the nearby forest, and all the trains were still hauled by steam train locomotives! This suddenly brought back all my wonderful memories of steam engines. As a result, I set out to capture surviving traces of the steam era with my camera.

In the first month of 1998, I started on my 72km journey on a 28-ton steam train from Reed River to Willow Mountain. The carriage was less than half the size of modern cars hauled by diesel. There was no electricity and the passengers had to use candles for light. There were no greetings broadcast over the intercom and no graceful music, but I could hear a young mother crooning her baby to sleep and the dozing workers snoring. Most of the passengers traveling on this line were either forest workers or the nearby village residents. The small steam train was their only means of transport and connection with the outside world. By counting the electric poles flashing past the train windows, I was able to roughly estimate that the train speed was 10-15km/hour. The steam locomotives might not be able to catch the pace of the times, but it offered us a peaceful feeling that we can hardly find in today’s mechanized society anymore. I was anxious to capture this unusual feeling, therefore, I carried my photography-kit bag and started my strenuous pursuit of the steam experience from one forest to another one, from one locomotive to another. Though all different types of lens-long lens, wide angle lens and fish-eye lens, I have seen so many beautiful scenes: a station with only one staff; a housewife with her children on her back, carrying chicken and duck, going to visit her husband; wagon car after wagon full of round logs and oil; happy children running behind the small forest train…but none of then could be compared with what I saw through the heat and haze: the proud outline of the locomotive at the head of the train, with steam shooting up to the sky.

After 2000, I searched for places with few people around, or dramatic locations under bridges and so on, where I stayed for days and nights. I adjust the camera angle while waiting alone. For me, the great roar coming closer from the other side of the mountain was like a drop of water for and extremely thirsty person in the desert. My whole being became excited when this moment came. The train passed by in a few fleeting seconds, but the grand presence of the steam locomotive had already became eternal on my film. All my trouble and worry disappeared in a flash within a click of my camera shutter.

My footprints chasing steam locomotives can be found all over China: from the Xing-An-Ling Forest to the hinterland of Chang-Bai Mountain in Jilin province; from one steam train museum to another museum, from the Ji-Tong Railway line through the deserts of Inner-Mongolia to the tropical rain forests of Hainan province and Yunnan province. Through my camera lens, I have devoted myself to the challenge of reaching any place that has a trace of a steam locomotive despite whirling snow or clouds of mosquitoes.

In addition to the passionate pursuit of the last steam locomotives in China and capturing them on film, I’ve learnt all the stories about the history of the steam age. In 1825, the Englishman George Stephenson invented the “The Rocket” locomotive, which marked the beginning of effective steam transportation. The first simple steam locomotive made in China was built in the Kaiping Yaogezhuang works with crude equipment in 1881. In July 1952, Si-Fang Locomotive Works successfully produced our country’s first “Liberation” locomotive, which began the first phase in the development of China’s steam locomotive industry. On 21 December 1988, the last “Forward” locomotive QJ7207 left the Datong locomotive works, which brought to an end the 36-year history of advanced steam locomotive manufacture in China. A total of 9698 locomotives (4714 “Forward” locomotives), of all types, were built in this period. In December 2005, with the withdrawal of the last batch of steam locomotive from Jitong Railway, the steam era ended in China. However, the preservation campaign all around the world continues, and many enthusiasts are still coming to China aiming to collect relics of China’s steam heritage.

The story of steam locomotives and me is yet to be finished. Here, I only have one wish, that people would again experience memories of the steam age through my photographs.

Held Within the Rocks and Dust

Whitney Johnson-Lessard

Project Space

Artist Statement:

Held Within the Rocks and Dust explores the alchemy of painting through the memories and agencies of materials. What are we made of? Our bodies, our fears, our dreams? How are we physically connected to all life and the Earth? What will we become? This group of paintings seeks to find relationships between representation, abstraction, and physicality. Many of the materials in these paintings are repurposed and have had past lives - scrap fabric, gifted paint, found wood, and pigments foraged from kitchen scraps, campfires, and industrial sites. Do these past lives continue to exist? Does their existence change? Do we change with them, and how? Can we guide their future? What kinds of agency do our imaginations have?

Whitney Johnson-Lessard's work is guided by transformation, imagining futures, and relationships with the more-than-human world. She engages with living beings and their temporalities, and is concerned with materiality.

“This project is supported with Arts Dollars funds, provided by the Illinois Arts Council Agency, ArtsPartners of Central Illinois, National Endowment for the Arts, and Community Foundation of Central Illinois.”

The opening reception for this exhibition will be January 3rd, 5-8 p.m.

The work will be on view January 3rd - 31st.

Gallery events are always free and open to the public.