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Picture Series

Guligo Jia
I'm Carmen

Wen Langni brushes his wig before going out. He was born in a small town in the autonomous region of Guangxi, which is in southern China. Wen Langni now lives in Shanghai – he faces less judgement here than in his home town.
Wen Langni samples cosmetics at a Shanghai department store as people stare. The times when he worried out being stared at and mocked are long past.
Zhong Yanlong poses for a portrait in his hotel room in Beijing. He is a fashion designer and refuses to take on any specific gender label.
Wen Langni on a street in Shanghai.
Gao Li is genderqueer and actively fights for the rights of the LGBTQ community in Beijing.
Maria works as a hairdresser in Shanghai. The neighbours appreciate his personality and professionalism.
Maria takes part in the first drag-queen competition at a gay bar in Shanghai.
Maria is elected best drag queen.
Miko has left his false eyelashes lying on the table.
Miko puts on make-up in a hotel room. He was born as a man and would now like nothing more than to become a real woman.
The audience at a gay bar in Shanghai wait for Miko’s performance.
Miko’s feet have swollen from wearing high heels.
Miko lives alone in a rented room in Shanghai. He misses his mother. He turned his back on his home years ago because his parents couldn’t accept his appearance.
Miko in the shower. He would like to undergo gender reassignment surgery and finally become a real woman, but he still can’t afford the operation. 11 April 2016.
Miko’s wound after a breast operation at a private clinic in Zhengzhou. He is in great pain and in debt. 11 April 2017.
After the operation, Miko looks in the mirror. Most transgender people prefer private clinics to state-run hospitals because the clinics offer more privacy and cost less. However, they often have poor hygiene conditions.
Miko has recovered from the operation. For him, it represents a rebirth.
Miko wears a new dress.
Miko is biologically a man, but he is also a pretty, delicate young woman.
Miko kisses his boyfriend on a bridge in Shanghai. He says it is his greatest desire to get married and have a baby. But as a transgender person, it’s not easy to find true love.

In China, members of the LGBTQ community enjoy their freedom despite prudish comrades and routine discrimination. Wealth, recent political decisions and, above all, the Internet make this possible. Around 70 million homosexual, bisexual and trans people live in China, making it the world’s largest LGBTQ community. However, only a few admit to their sexual identities, for tradition and binary gender thinking characterise life in China, particularly in rural areas. From 2016 until 2019, Guligo Jia accompanied her friends who for many years were unwilling to accept any gender label. Her photos depict moments of joy and grief, in intimacy and in the protection of a stage setting. The images reveal secret dreams and illustrate obvious problems. More than that, these pictures show people presenting themselves as they see themselves – with dignity and full of longing.

  • Community
  • Discrimination
  • Everyday Life
  • Identity

»I was fascinated by their vigor of life.«

Guligo Jia
3 Questions
1. The door opener: Can you describe a formative moment in your career as a visual journalist?

When I was studying Journalism for my master’s degree in Beijing, a teacher from Britain lent me a camera, and I started to photograph my home town. Though exhausted, I found myself enjoying the process very much. And this photo essay won the first prize in a photography contest on campus. After that, I found my passion in life, which is to become a photographer.

2. The decisive moment: When did you first encounter your topic and why did you decide to cover it photographically?

I encountered my subjects in a gay bar in Shanghai in 2015, and they were having a drag queen contest. I was fascinated by their vigour of life during our encounter, but they also meet so many dilemmas. So I was touched by their stories and I decided to document them, trying to undermine people’s stereotypes against them through my photography. Besides photography, we’ve been friends for five years now, and we’ve been helping each other through these years.

3. The future: What could the visual journalism of the future be like?

As a matter of fact, photojournalism is on decline in China, most of the news agencies in China have cut down photography departments or transformed them into video departments. So there’s a trend in developing video journalism in China as the date goes unlimited. I think, maybe, the future of visual journalism will focus more on short videos, instead of in-depth visual reports, and forms suitable for social media like Tik Tok will be more popular because everyone is reading news on their cell phone and people are more distracted by various notifications on their phones.

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Guligo Jia talks about encountering gender related obstacles in her own photojournalistic career.
Found in Research

“Je suis Carmen”

Curated by Marie Kolb

© for all photos by the photographers
© for videos Lumix Festival Hanover, if not indicated otherwise.

*1989 in Chongqing, China
Guligo Jia is a photographer and documentary film-maker. She currently lives in Beijing. Her journalistic work concentrates on the topics of gender, femininity, relationships and family. After completing her studies of Journalism at the Beijing Foreign Studies University, she worked in the multimedia area of a Chinese news agency. She is now a freelance journalist.

cargocollective.com/guligojia
@guligo_jia

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