Wang Fuchun

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Wang Fuchun photographing people on a train

Wang Fuchun (Chinese: 王福春; 1943–2021) was a Chinese photographer and railway worker.

In 1963, he trained as an engine driver in Suihua and, after working in a variety of roles on the railway, became a photographer in 1984.[1]

He specialised in taking pictures of people on trains and these were collected in Chinese on the Train in 2001.[2] He took thousands of train journeys, covering over 100,000 kilometers and took over 200,000 photographs with his Seagull camera.[3] He kept the rolls of film which took up most of the space in his home.[3]

In 1996, he won the Golden Statue of the China Photographers Association – the premier award for individual photography in China.[4][5] In 2004, he won an award as "Outstanding Chinese photographer" at the Pingyao International Photography Festival. In 2014, he was listed as one of the most influential photographers by Invisible Photographer Asia.[3] In 2019, his photographs were exhibited at the National Railway Museum in York.[1]

Wang Fuchun died from an undisclosed illness on March 13, 2021.[5]

References

  1. ^ a b Simon Baylis (10 May 2019), New exhibition by acclaimed photographer Wang Fuchun opens at National Railway Museum in York, Science Museum Group
  2. ^ "Closely observed trains", The Economist, vol. 438, no. 9237, p. 78, 20 March 2021
  3. ^ a b c Shi Yangkun (15 March 2021), The Long, Winding Journey of China's Train-Riding Photographer
  4. ^ "The 3rd China Photography Awards (1996)", People's Daily, 9 November 2016
  5. ^ a b China's famous train photographer Wang Fuchun, whose work attracted international acclaim, has died in Beijing aged 79, 15 March 2021