According to Mr. Tang Guo, this series of photographs are "just pictures".

I know his mind is in peace. He presents us two "objectivities" at once: first, he objectively records a village scenario of some place in Jing Country, South Anhui Province; and at the same time, he objectively views his own plain and diversified graphic records. A person quietly enters a dimension of "theirs", while generates "my" image history about their dimensions, in his daily life, which endows more specific sense of time to a different living space in text.

When reading these photographs, these "just pictures", I understand that the objectivity and peace inside are the results of ongoing practices in that place and within their customs. It is a kind of silent observation, beyond the surprise of a stranger. He wrote in one of his letter:

The entire village makes living on rice field, silkworm, tea, bamboo shoot and chestnut.Most of their production tools are traditional. Rice field by buffalo, tea by hand, silkworm by bamboo basket, without substantial changes from ancient time. The annual tea output of the village is over 2,000KG, and 30 tons for chestnut.

His words and photographs share the same style. Therefore, the observation effect is everywhere.

In fact, for me, these pure and natural village scenarios, as well as the buildings in the village, are either simple lyrics or not. Their spirits and the villagers are already partially involved and surrounded by the modernization tide. And tourism is the pioneer force of the tide. So, the series of photographs taken by Mr. Tang Guo, by his objective and plain style, is actually an early monody of a historical village, or our future "dream of the past".

                  
Thursday, May 12th, 2005
In Qushu Room, Nanhu, Beijing