A Twenty-Year Trajectory: Selected Train Photography Calendar

Every page is a specific "present moment" from the past.

"What have you been doing these past three or four years?" Faced with such a question, I want to say: I have been exploring the world, living life on my own terms, and adjusting my state to the absolute best, all so that I could share even more exquisite works with everyone once again.

A Space-Time Dialogue Spanning Twenty Years

July 24, 2022, marked twenty years since I began photographing trains. Looking back to that afternoon twenty years ago, an 11-year-old me, armed with a film camera, recorded train Y539 departing for Yanqing South at 15:29 at Xizhimen Station. That was the starting point of my trajectory. Today, as my feet have walked all across China and stepped out into the world, my understanding of "railways" is no longer limited to machinery and beautiful scenery, but has become a multi-dimensional life woven together by railways, people, objects, and events.

Jeme Tien Yow-Style Rigor: Every Page is the Same Day

When the editor asked me, "Can we just put photos matching the corresponding seasons into their respective months?", I flatly refused. Just as Jeme Tien Yow admonished when building the Beijing-Zhangjiakou Railway: there can be no "close enough"—it must be rigorous.

I view this calendar as a piece of art rather than a simple printed product. I set a nearly harsh goal for myself: the photograph for every single day in the calendar must be selected from works captured on that exact same calendar date over the past twenty years.

As you flip through the pages, you will witness:

• Power Spanning Eras: From the smoke and dust of steam locomotives, the roaring run of diesel and electric locomotives, to the sense of speed of contemporary high-speed rail.

• Magnificent Geographical Span: From the snowfields of the Northeast and the Gobi deserts of the Northwest to southern coasts and deep mountain valleys.

• Witness to Disappearance and Preservation: The calendar includes the very first train photo I took at age 11, set against the backdrop of the Xizhimen Station East Platform 1—which was designated as a Beijing municipal cultural relic in 2021, only to be almost entirely demolished in early 2022.