Tianqiutao Chen
Seen/Unseen: The Migrant Children
PHOTO OXFORD OPEN CALL 2025: RUNNER UP
Seen/Unseen: The Migrant Children centers on observing and documenting migrant workers and their children in Beijing - a highly marginalized and underrepresented community from less developed areas around China that temporarily migrates to urban centers in search of better employment and educational opportunities.
Migrant workers have been the engine of China’s spectacular economic growth over the last 30 years. They contribute to the abrupt urbanization of China and enjoy some benefits of urban life. However, they remain marginalized and face institutionalized discrimination. Their children have limited access to education, healthcare, and social welfare.
During my voluntary service for a non-profit organization in two migrant villages on the outskirts of Beijing, I initiated this project where I collaborated with a group of migrant children, teaching them photography while providing them with disposable film cameras, and enabling them to document their lives in Beijing. The work consists of two visual components: portraits of the migrant children taken by me as deadpan observations of their harsh living conditions; candid and playful snapshots captured by the children using cameras I gave them, revealing incredibly in-depth and authentic perspectives from the true insiders. The portraits and snapshots contextualize each other and intricately display an intrinsic atmosphere and moments in their daily lives. Meanwhile, there are handwritten notes by the children indicating their experiences living in both Beijing and their hometowns.
This project is a participatory visual investigation transferring the discourse power and subverting the traditional subject-object relationship in documentary photography, revealing both the seen and unseen aspects of the lived realities of migrant children in Beijing. With the fast and abrupt development of the economy of China, they may be beneficiaries in some ways but are also the victims. The displacement and alienation experienced by the migrant people result in their complicated social and living conditions and states of mind that bring them both dilemmas and moments of contentment. Those aftermaths in different layers addressed in this project reflect the complexity of China’s current rapid urbanization.
Chen Tianqiutao is an artist and educator working in China and the United States. Chen earned a BFA in Photography from the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing and received an MFA in Photography and an MA in Art + Design Education from the Rhode Island School of Design.
Chen’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including at the Center for Photography at Woodstock (Woodstock, NY), ClampArt (New York, NY), Photographic Center Northwest (Seattle, WA), Rhode Island Center for Photographic Arts (Providence, RI), Figge Art Museum (Davenport, IA), Minneapolis College of Art and Design (Minneapolis, MN), CAFA Art Museum (Beijing, China), Minsheng Art Museums (Beijing, China), DongGang International Photo Festival (Yeongwol, South Korea), Taipei International Photo Festival (Taipei, Taiwan), and Copenhagen Photo Festival (Copenhagen, Denmark), among others. His work was selected for the 2022 Critical Mass Top 50. His photobook The Last Post won the Lucie Photo Book Prize for the Independent Publishing Category and was shortlisted for the Images Vevey Book Award.
Insta: @chentqt
