Introductory Course: Photography in China and Japan: Visual Narratives between Tradition and Modernity

Photography, at the border between art, document and social practice, has had a unique path in East Asia. In China and Japan, this visual medium has been deeply influenced by local traditions, the accelerated process of modernization, but also by the dynamics of political power, building over time an extremely diverse and complex visual history.

This four-session course aims to explore the evolution of photography in China and Japan, two cultural spaces with rich but very different visual traditions. We will analyze photography in relation to major themes: modernity, memory, ideology, visual poetics and social criticism, and we will review, in a critical chronology, the key moments in which photography was not only a witness but also an active agent of social change – from images taken by 19th-century pioneers such as Felice Beato or Lai Afong, to the provocative forms of contemporary photographic art, represented by Araki Nobuyoshi, Wang Qingsong or Rinko Kawauchi.

Each session will combine historical context, image analysis, and critical debate, aiming to provide participants with a coherent framework for understanding East Asian photography in its local logic, but also in the broader context of global visual culture. Each session will also include: illustrated lecture, image discussion, case studies, and applied debate.

The course is open to anyone interested in the history of photography, visual culture, East Asia, or in developing a critical vocabulary applicable to the image.

Ana-Cristina Irian is a research-based artist, researcher and curator, active in the field of collections, photographic archives and multimedia projects, with studies in sociology (Trento and Regensburg), visual anthropology (Bucharest and Perugia) and a PhD in visual arts from the National University of Arts in Bucharest. Her artistic practice, guided by the motto No one left behind , emphasizes objects of memory and integrates photographic materials into contemporary artworks. She has participated with works in over 50 exhibitions in Romania and abroad and is a member of the Union of Visual Artists of Romania and the European platform Futures. Cristina has been involved in projects such as Dacia 50 – an ethnography of the Dacia car at 50 years old , Oltenia Fountains – a mapping of community fountains in southern Romania , Arhive poVestite – recovery and promotion of private photographic archives , Fragmentum , Heretheylived , #mili-eu. Ileana, Mr. B's grandmother , Debara , Sacoșa Est-Vest – Libertate.Corp.Resistance , EERIE, The Titans – research based art . She published the object work STRATA / B (Omnia Photo, 2020), and the visual experiments made between 2016–2020 became two object books: The seven poems of Cristina Irian and The eighth poem of Cristina Irian , made in collaboration with the artist Mircea Bochiș and included in the European collection Versopolis – Technological Innovations in Literature. She is the author of the volumes Photographic Collections and Archives Today, in the Digital World (2022) and Space Production and the Social Life of Street Art (2024), published by Tritonic Publishing House. In 2024, she was a finalist at the LensCulture Art Photography Awards. Her most recent project, The Titans and the Vanishing Green, is presented at the Chester Photo Festival 2025.

Other details:

The course has 4 sessions:

• Wednesday, July 16, 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM

• Thursday, July 17, 6:00 PM - 9:00 PM

• Wednesday, July 23, 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM,

• Thursday, July 24, 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM

No technical knowledge of photography is required, the course is oriented towards understanding and critical interpretation of the image.