Return of the Humanitarian Subjectivity Kuo Li-hsin
 Associate Professor, Department of Radio & Television National Chengchi University Chen Chin-pao is always engaging his work and life with the soul of art. As an art teacher in Denkong Elementary School in Taipei, he is always busy in balancing his work with family life, while retaining his practice for conceptual photography. Not satisfied with the outstanding achievements of his early work, A Moment of Beauty: A Collection of Images of Betel Nut Girls, Chen continues to develop several projects such as Heaven on Earth, Ordinary Household, Circumgyration Project. The latter was created in his working environment on his regular job site, photography was employed to reconstruct the possibility of a real social experience and memory. Indeed, this is a simple project which full of difficulty and challenge. Circumgyration Project took place at Taipei, Yokohama (Japan), Hudong(Korea) , Shanghi(China), Chen guided the school children from the schools to participate in reconstructing various situations of the shared memory on the campus. Although Chen comments the process in working images much as “the middle-age adult who wants to revisit childhood, " Circumgyration Project is definitely not the fairy tale of revisiting one's childhood with a happy ending, nor is not one of consumer nostalgia images merely for entrainment. In the project children jointly performed a complex world both pure and sophisticated: their joy or frustration, naughty scenes or intimate mood, fantasy or loneliness, glory or embarrassment are usually overlooked and not taken seriously by standard education or by adults. Chen's subtle observation and documentation presented as the staged photography. In various sites, such as the earliest, longest and largest the "Deng Kong Series", Chen sees his participants, namely his students, not only as the photographic subject matter but also the creator. This dual status of his participants dialectically produces a new dimension for image. On one hand, to have his class students to become photography subjects is an ethical issue that needs to be confronted and resolved artistically. On the other hand, the theme came from students' situations need to be readdressed in Chen's artistic concern. To go beyond a simple record or description of them and to present the performance with artistic dimensions are much more difficult challenges than they seem to be. As for the ethical issues in presenting his students, I have a strong confidence with how Chen deals with the relationship between the creator and the photography subjects. The confidence came from his attitude while dealing with the subject of the betel nut girls, and the viewing and recording angle reflected in the works. From A Moment of Beauty on to Circumgyration Project, a mutual spirit of his photographs is the respect and concern for the meaning and location of the humanitarian subject. In the portraits of the betel nut girls, there is nothing for peeping the female body in the name of the social justice record, nor is there a reward for social victims with sympathy and mercy. Chen restored the betel nut girls to real human beings with their job site, an affective state full of multiple psychological effects, and he sees these girls with a close observation and objective calmness. In Heaven on Earth,

there is no one on the screen, and only the landscape of a space shared by humans, the spirits, and the Gods. But in the landscape photography of social and cultural perspectives foregrounds the significant question of human's position and subject. A main idea of Circumgyration Project is to demand a serious reading of these children as intersubjectivities full of a complex multi-faceted behavior and psychological state, thus resist the children to become the copy of grown-ups. By re-constructing the fine description of children's living and the life experiences of Japan, South Korea and China, the words hidden behind the image remind the viewers the importance and unique aspect of every life experience, detailing the growing pains of any child. The Taiwanese, Japanese, Korean and Chinese societies that were influenced by Confucianism generally do not allow the child individual autonomy. It is the reason that children always suffer from the mental harm arise from adults' authoritarian personality of traditional Confucius society. On one hand, Circumgyration Project tells that the photographer re-builds and manifests subjective meaning of children's life experiences and returns to the position of human beings. On the other hand, it makes adults to review their own past traumatic experiences, and then gain more wisdom and consciousness while resituate the adults to the memories of childhood. The secret of Chen's art lies in the formal property in presenting photographic aesthetics as the thinking process and practical application. Chen reflects in-depth on photographic art and continues to explore how to truthfully express the image whether there is any unique magic in photography that cannot be replaced by any text, and thus in the technical aspects of photography, Chen conducts a particular measurement through a set experiment. In A Moment of Beauty Chen experiments with different visual vocabulary in the posed figure; Heaven and Earth, the fixed tripod shot; and Circumgyration Project, the directed performance. All done in the large format camera, and what he asks is the precise composition, color, exposure, depth of field, lens type, with detailing presentation. Chen knows the cause and effect of photographic means with a proper viewing distance. However, these methods, instruments, and technical attention are not to show off the techniques itself, or as the fetishism of the subject, they reflect Chen's unique style and the ability to think about photographic aesthetics. In an interview, he mentioned almost no post-processing is done in his own photography and almost no digital equipment; only a Polaroid is used for testing the picture. He said his main work was done before photography. Therefore, Chen has never used digital camera, not for the exclusion of new technology but a way of mastering the art of photography. In short, Chen's photographic aesthetics is a kind of "slow photography," demanding an extensive reading. Since the theory and practice of "decisive moment" of photographic aesthetics, the art of photography pays more attention to capture the moment in rushing for the most exciting and action moments and showing rhythm and movement. Although the special qualities are difficult to be replaced by other imagery arts, a kind of impatient, reflective concept of intuitive response for the real world is also encouraged. The intuitive way does not mean it cannot create attractive images, but photography discourse often could not respond to the world in-depth. It also has to do with such photographical aesthetics. Chen has always had a great patience with

time and subject matter. He slowly manages and adjusts his own understanding of subject matter and methods of expression. His organizing and thinking behind the photography art is probably completed way before the shooting moment. The final image product in a sense can be said to be the visual results of his thought and response to the theme. Chen is not unaware of the gimmick of the camera, nor is his camera aesthetics is a wayward fixation to the good old days. He just reminds us by creating a photography art demands an expanded duration and requires some thoughts to dwell on. The motor driven cameras or digital equipment are not necessary for Chen. His reflection on photographic aesthetics is to identify his subject matters, and most importantly to be with them. Years ago, when reading the work of A Moment of Beauty, I often think the image of these betel nut girls in the plain, flat portrait has a peculiar charm that cannot be described in words. How did he make it happened? In Heaven on Earth and Circumgyration Project, I saw the same charm that makes people both contemplate and meditate on it. The affection for Chen's photographs lies in the effects to tell the great from the plain, the extraordinary from the mundane.