In Shanghai an old industrial area has been converted into an art space. We arrived a bit late to go inside but there was still plenty of fun to be had wandering around and grabbing some night HDR.
Here is one of the special animated creations for the recent drop on OpenSea.
This entire area of Pudong completely empties out at night. I was like literally the only person walking around the streets. It was kind of eerie in a post-apocalyptic kind of way. It did make for some great photos… I just had on my earphones and was dancing around with my tripod like a loon. I’m sure if any Chinese people did actually see me… they’d be thinkin’ “Man, these tourist people are crazy!”
Pudong is the Blade-Runner area of Shanghai and it’s pretty much empty at night. There are not many hotels there and there are no living areas for the Chinese, so it’s pretty much a ghost town every night. You can just walk around and take as many photos as you can until you are exhausted. It’s a bit weird and lonely in a way because there is nobody else around… no convenience stores… no restaurants… no bars… it’s just a bunch of office buildings sleeping for the next day of activity.
Here’s a rarely visited area of Shanghai where this old factory has been converted into an art space. Unfortunately, we got there too late and we could only kinda look through the window. There was a lot of contemporary art in there that looked completely confusing, so it’s probably just as well that I didn’t go in… I could be confused from the outside rather than be confused from the inside.
As part of my “thing” with the Ritz-Carlton, they let me take whatever photos I want to take, which is great! They usually have a few suggestions here and there that might be photogenic. Some are good ideas, and some kind of come out to be duds. Anyway, at this hotel in Shanghai they have a nightly ritual where they light lanterns to illuminate the main hallway that leads to the lobby. The women dress up in traditional garb, so I thought it would a fun shooting opportunity, and it was!
This monolith along the Bund, Shanghai is where the whole group met for the photo walk while on the Asia tour. Besides all the great people I met there, it was also amazing to run into Liam Gowing, who was a guy I went to Jesuit High School with! He was like the “cool” guy that was the lead singer of the band… I was not cool in high school, believe me. But now, we were both kinda cool, I guess. Hey, cool is a state of mind, right?
I’ve never actually been up inside this thing, but maybe I should go sometime. Well, I don’t have any plans to go to China soon… at least in the next five years or so. I kind of had my “fill” of China after being there about 10 times. Maybe that sounds a bit snobby or something… I don’t really mean it to sound like that. But the pollution and the not-living-in-balance-with-Earth stuff kind of grates on me after a while, you know? But they do have some cool cities, on the other hand!
Continuing our “Covid-fun” to get people excited to travel again… well, even though China may NOT be the first on your list, here are some favorites from Shanghai!
It’s been a while, but I finally updated my Now page!
See that obelisk thing there in the lower left? That was the gathering spot for our big Shanghai photo walk! That was a particularly fun one! I saw an old friend from Jesuit High School, Liam Gowing. I was completely surprised that he randomly happened to be there in the middle of Shanghai! I had not seen him in about 20 years and it was really fun to catch up. Thanks again to everyone that came out for that event!
