It was slightly unnerving, to be lying there above the swollen and turbulent Pearl River, undercutting the empty, but for the wet smell of old piss, embankment, seeing and feeling another raging monsoonal deluge lumbering across Fangcun and towards Haizhu. With my eyes closed and the sharp tang of urine issuing from the concrete planters, my vision was populated with clusters of sweaty migrant workers in dirty and ill-fitting suit jackets, cheap leather loafers and white socks, singlets rolled up to their nipples, standing on the parapet at night unloading themselves into the soupy torrent.
This was in late-May, when Guangzhou magazine 周末画报 Modern Weekly, who had recently done a feature on 岭南启示录 Apocalypse PRD, asked me to be part of their 创意广州十三行 Creative Canton interviews with 13 Guangzhou artists, designers and other creative people in 新视线 The Outlook Magazine. My afternoon with them in Haizhu Park I wrote about earlier. I was really looking forward to seeing it in print, but decided on schlepping through airport lounges instead, and only last night remembered it was probably out by now, so spent an hour rifling through their site to come up with the goods.
The other creative profiles include architect Rem Koolhaas, artist Cao Fei, and choreographer Long Yunna, all here for easy reading.
