Ouyang Xingkai was born in the city of Xiangtan, Hunan Province in China. In October 2003, Ouyang visited Hongjiang, where he made friends with Shen Xianghua, an elder of the town who still kept his clear memories of everything happened in the past eighty years—both glory and decline of Hongjiang. During Ouyang’s visit, Shen showed him around and told him stories and legends of the town. All these reminded Ouyang of his own childhood experience and he began to take photos of the town and its people in the following years.
Hongjiang sits at the junction of the Yuanshui and Wushui Rivers in western Hunan Province. Because of its significant location, Hongjiang was a major distribution center that connected Hunan, Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, and Hubei provinces. During Ming and Qing dynasty, Hongjiang became an important commercial town in southwestern China and reached its heyday at the beginning of the Republic of China. With its booming prosperity the town was well known as “little Nanjing”. However, water transportation started to decline as the road and railway transportation developed and expanded throughout the country. Hongjiang, as a result, gradually lost its significance and was forgotten by people. For more than a half century, numerous merchant families left their home and Hongjiang was preserved well as if time stopped here.
Ouyang first got interested in the special architecture Yin Zi Wu 窨子屋, or cellar houses. In the past, Yin Zi Wu used to be mansions of the rich merchants. These cellar houses have very tall exterior walls built with grey bricks for guarding against theft and fire safety. Attached with the walls is the interior wooden architecture structure. The roof inclined inwards and forms a rectangle atrium in the middle, letting in rains and sunshine. Lintels, window frames, columns are all carved with detailed patterns. From the architectural design we see the prosperous and luxurious living condition of the rich merchants in Hongjiang. But all these were gone.
Nowadays, Hongjiang became a quiet “undeveloped” town after it was deprived of its significance in transportation. Most of the residents now living in these Yin Zi Wu are elders who still keep their traditional simple life regardless of the dramatic industrial development outside of the town.
No. 166-4, Jianshe street, Tuokou town, Hongjiang. Peng Zaoxiu, 80 years old (left) and Li Guomei, 70 years old (right).
Zhu Guoshou, 91 years old, has been living in No. 17 Aozibao for 30 years. When Ouyang visited the museum, he especially talked about this photo and explained some items in the picture. The back rows of cabinets were made by the old man. During the Cultural Revolution, China made commercial exchanges with Romania and imported these Romanian style cabinets. Zhu couldn’t afford these popular furniture and he imitated the style to make his own cabinets. There is a poster on the left cabinet where two young women can be seen. One of them is Joan Chen (I don’t remember which one). Joan Chen was one of the Chinese actresses who first came to the U.S. and explore their Hollywood career. Then it’s the old television, on which, I think everyone can recognize, is the Titanic movie clip.
Ceng Chunchang, 76 years old, now lives in No. 10 Youlou alley with his 73 years old wife Xiang Lanxiang, a retired worker of Hongjiang Food Company.
Shen Jinqiu, born in 1921, now lives in No. 26, Xiangyangping, Hongjiang.
As this particular photograph shows us, Shen Jinqiu, a Chinese medical practitioner with over 70 years of working experience, is taking the pulse of a little girl. Under the girl’s wrist, a book serves as a pulse feeling cushion. On the shelves on the back wall are roles of jars that contain various herbs. Everything in this photograph reflects a typical traditional “taste” of the elders in Hongjiang—using colorful New Year pictures as wall decoration, hanging frames with photos of family members inserted, sticking newspapers on walls. The gentle light comes in through the window and gives the interior setting a quiet calm moment.
During his visit, Ouyang talked about how he got familiar with every family of the town, how he joined the families during Spring Festival (as significant as Christmas in western countries), how he witnessed the young daughter of a local family got married, etc. He took pictures for the local people and gave the pictures to them as presents. Ouyang also talked to every person (especially the elders) about their life and background. He was using his camera to record the old traditions, local cultures and life styles that are gradually lost as the elders pass away.
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