Shanghai is not a subdued city. It is loud, teeming with myriad facets, a constant whirlwind of shifts and changes. Look around, and you’ll see that in the metropolis’ mad plethora of colors, architecture and people. Each corner has a story to tell, from the quaint tree-lined streets of the former French Concession to the few crumbling shikumens still standing and the glass and steel structures of more recent years.
Over the last decade, photographer Nicky Almasy has been an avid observer of this reality. His photo series ‘Shanghai Shadows’ reflects that, albeit not in the rich, brassy, vibrant way that often characterize the depiction of this metropolis.
“I have been capturing Shanghai on camera since 2006 both for myself and, since 2009, for That’s Shanghai, and witnessed its mad, larger-than-life evolution in every aspect,” he says. “I generally shoot in color, but I’ve found myself really bored with over-edited and overphotoshopped pictures. We’re living in an age when everyone can take a half decent photo on their smartphones, and social media are saturated with filtered, altered expressions of reality. ‘Shanghai Shadows’ is an answer to that. It shows the ‘negative’ of the city, only focusing on the shapes of things that surround us.”
The result is a collection of striking images presenting Shanghai in a new, almost stripped down angle, with vibrant pockets of lights and shadows that capture people, buildings and roads. Each photo is an almost eerie rendering of our bustling city.
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“I’ve been walking around these last few months driving myself mad because I’m only concentrating on shadows you can really recognize the city from,” says Almasy. “The project is ongoing, I don’t really know when I'll finish it.”
The photos showcased here are part of the first chapter of a book entirely dedicated to portraying Shanghai in black and white, which Almasy plans to publish later this year.
Almasy is also working on two color photo books, one a collection of his photography work in shanghai over the last 10 years, the other a six-year-long documentation of the construction of Shanghai Tower. check more of his photography at almasyphotography.com.
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