Living the CITY: Reflections
On Thursday, February 20th, 2025, the Parkside Galleries hosted the opening and wine reception for the photographic exhibition, Living the City: Contemporary Everyday in China.
The event kicked off with a warm welcome from BCU’s Interim Pro VC, Professor Maxine Lintern, who introduced the exhibition and highlighted the amazing work being done at BCU. Professor Joshua Jiang followed with an overview of the research cluster Centre for Chinese Visual Arts (CCVA). Dr. Federica Mirra, Leverhulme Early Career Fellow, then took the stage to explain the curatorial concept and the research behind the exhibition. After the speeches, guests enjoyed drinks and conversation, both inside and outside the Parkside Building. The event brought together a diverse mix of BCU students, staff, and people from various backgrounds, creating a relaxed and engaging environment where ideas and experiences were shared.
Federica Mirra, Moped against billboard, Nanjing 2024 (exhibition view). Photograph by Kori Thompson.
Some attendees shared their experience:
“Such a great exhibition! Federica captures authentic moments of urban life amid China’s rapid transformation, offering a unique perspective to understand the complexity of modern China” (Angela Huang, member of China West Midlands Planning team and Board member of the Chinese Community Centre Birmingham)
“I enjoyed how this exhibition represented the everyday, in particular focusing on the collective activities. It was nice to see this representation, against what we usually see in the media”
“I am not super aware of specific Chinese culture and society, but the exhibition has called attention to sides of Chinese culture/society I had not really considered before, nor have ever explored.”
“Having travelled to as well as worked & lived in China since 2005, the exhibition really beautifully picks up & depicts facets of Chinese street life & humble yet skilled street level art.”
Federica Mirra, dancers, Changsha 2024 (exhibition view). Photograph by Kori Thompson.
Federica Mirra, LED lightshow, Wuhan 2024 (exhibition view). Photograph by Kori Thompson.
The exhibition featured eight panels of photo collages mounted on a grate system outside the Parkside building. The photos resemble posters along the streets, offering snapshots of everyday life. On display are activities like water calligraphy, street dancing, playing majiang, growing vegetables, and enjoying light displays in the cities. They document some of the ways in which urban dwellers negotiate and re-adapt to China’s everchanging urban spaces. Indeed, the exhibition reflects on how the speed and scale of urbanisation, alongside the stark presence of the Chinese government and Chinese Communist Party, have made cities particularly fascinating in terms of urban visual culture and aesthetics. This plethora of urban landscapes aims to speak about the Chinese city as a site for multisensorial encounters, where top-down policies coexist with bottom-up activities and rhythms, forming a hybrid and vibrant urban aesthetics.
These images were designed to reflect the visual language of the streets and urban spaces in China. The visible, cheap plastic cable ties secure the posters to the metal grates, attaching to them a raw, cheap and industrial quality. Likewise, images are pasted on top of each other and layered through glue and wallpaper paste, creating cracks, textures, and giving an overall sense of roughness. Outdoors and exposed to the elements, the panels have assumed a more worn-out look, with some edges curling up and the moisture in the air creating a patina. Overall, this installation plays with this urban, street aesthetics and the smart pragmatism that is often adopted by urban dwellers in China.
Federica Mirra, Players, Changsha 2024 (detail). Photograph by Kori Thompson.
Federica Mirra, Water calligraphy, Guiyang 2024 (detail). Photograph by Kori Thompson.
The exhibition is part of Leverhulme Early Career Research Fellowship, titled the The City as Art: living aesthetics in 21st century China. This project focuses on the aesthetics of everyday life, often overlooked in traditional art spaces like galleries and museums. By displaying the panels outdoors, the exhibition invites spontaneous encounters, curious contemplation and, perhaps, the public’s engagement with representations that they might, or might not, be familiar with.
Federica says: I’d like to thank everyone who supported this project. Special thanks to Stuart Whipps for his help with selecting the photos and curatorial concept, and Laura Gale for printing the background images. Thanks also to the technicians at the School of Art and Parkside for their assistance, the Communications and Marketing team for promoting the event, and Kori Thompson for capturing the opening through photographs. A big thank you to Lauren Walden, Zhou Yang, Adam Wynn, and John Hall for their contributions. Finally, this exhibition would have not been possible without the support of the College of Arts and Design and the Leverhulme Trust, whose generous funding helped bring it all together.
