-- Artists statement
‘A Happy Arrangement’ was inspired by the fictional writings of JG Ballard. The project was shot during a 6 month artist residency in Shanghai in which we wandered the rubble left by torn down buildings. It explored themes of mass urbanisation & identity in China. The artifacts are abandoned survivors, undesirable hints of human presence, left behind because of their lack of commercial value. Mirroring the fate of their former owners, whose houses were destroyed to leave space for high profit residential developments, these scraps are conferred a new dignity associated with the aesthetics provided by mainstream consumerist society. In presenting the remains of a wild gentrification process we raise questions about the role of art as a means to archive the present, within the perspective of an uncertain future. In 2014, the photographs were exhibited at the How Art Museum Wenzhou & Fantom’s Curatorial group show ‘Invisible Cities’ with Art Hub Asia in Fes, Morocco.
Phillip & Anthony Reed are identical twin brothers, Phillip is a New York and London based photographer and Anthony is a Shanghai and London based photographer and filmmaker. Their photographs broadly explore the effects of the environment upon the experience of the individual, of particular interest is the way that the city is inextricably linked to the existence of human beings and the continuous process of interaction between the two. Phillip graduated from the London College of Communication in 2010, Anthony graduated from Norwich University of the Arts (NUA) in 2007. His practice broadly explores the subjective interpretation of the built environment and the rapid processes of change in China. While the twin brothers maintain individual projects their work has multiple crossovers and they regularly collaborate. Their works have been exhibited internationally including shows in Morocco, South Korea, China, Canada and the UK.