My Parents

Like many of his peers in China, Song Yongping was trained as a painter but began making photographs during the 1990s. Song’s My Parents begins by reproducing a communist-era photograph of his parents in their youth. Each subsequent image in the series offers a similarly composed, frontal view of his parents’ cramped apartment. This imagery contrasts starkly with the abundant glitter and promise of China’s new consumer culture. As Song’s parents crumple from disease and grief, the artist depicts himself in similar poses and attire: an empathic witness to their loss and to his own.