In July 2010, I returned to Beijing after a 19-year absence. The thing that struck me most was the almost complete change in the city – high-rises, shopping malls, McDonald’s and Starbucks on every corner. There is almost nothing left now of the low-rise, brown and grey, tile-roofed, bicycle commuting, coal-burning city from before.
This happens to every developing nation. But the idea of this very capitalistic progression happening so rapidly and openly in a country that still stubbornly carries the label “communist” is a huge contradiction. This is particularly clear in the very visible gap between the rich and the poor.
So I decided to document this gap.
