“The Poverty Line”, Ballarat International Foto Biennale, 28.08.2021 – 09.01.2022
The Poverty Line (2010 – 2020) sees artists Chow and Lin (Stefen Chow and Huiyi Lin) use the universal lens of food to examine the daily choices faced by those living on the poverty line. Creating a photographic case study of 36 countries and territories spanning six continents, Chow and Lin pose the question: What does poverty mean in different countries?
Chow and Lin’s images demonstrate the official poverty definition to derive a per-person, per-day rate, through selected food items bought in local marketplaces. The Poverty Line juxtaposes the food items atop local newspapers from the same day the food was purchased. The newspapers create a monotonous background crowded with headlines, while providing a visual marker of the cultural and geographical context. Chow and Lin’s images evoke a powerful response no matter the viewer as food and media are universally understood by all echelons of society.
This exhibition expands global conversations surrounding poverty and inequality, encouraging engagement and discussion of social structures, growth and divide in our increasingly entangled and globalised world.
Chow and Lin
The crux of Chow and Lin’s practice lies in their methodology of statistical, mathematical and computational techniques to address global issues since 2009. Through a typological, photographic approach, Chow and Lin’s projects are driven by the discursive backgrounds in economics, public policy, media, and these are further augmented by enduring exchanges with specialists from those fields. Their works have been referenced by the World Bank and showcased at the Triennale di Milano; United Nations ESCAP, Bangkok; Lianzhou Foto; Les Nuits Photographiques, Paris; China Central Academy of Fine Arts Museum; Getxo Photo; Hermitage Museum, Saint-Petersberg; Myanm/art gallery, Yangon; Museum of Modern Art, Tbilisi and the National University of Singapore Museum. Their works are in the permanent collection of the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, China Central Academy of Fine Arts Museum, Beijing, and Thessaloniki Museum of Photography. Chow and Lin (Stefen Chow and Huiyi Lin) are based in Beijing, China.
Installation View: “The Poverty Line”
Photo Credit: Garth Oriander/Ballarat International Foto Biennale
