Outsider Inside Photography

Karen Patterson—Photography

My strong interest in people, meeting and being with them, has been with me most of my life. It was no surprise that I graduated from University with an honors degree in Cultural Anthropology (1993), with a focus on looking at culture through film and photography. Deciding half way through the B.A. program that I needed more skills in photography, I also pursued an art minor in photography.

Since August of 1994, my life has centered on living/working/studying in China, and most of my free time in the beginning was spent walking around the streets of China as a way of trying to understand and see where it was that I was living. Although my language skills in Chinese at the outset were pretty much non-existent, I chose to “capture” and dialogue with the world around me vis-a-vis the use of my 35 mm camera, and as a result produced a substantial body of work.

After living in China for almost 6 years, my interest in making photos in China has moved from taking photos of Chinese street scenes to making documentary photographs of foreigners living in Beijing as part of “Beijing Station” using a medium format camera instead of a standard format 35mm. For this work in progress, I not only advertise in a local entertainment magazine in Beijing in order to find willing participants, but I require those who accept to do three things: chose a thing/person/or expression that they absolutely “love”; chose a location that gives them the feeling that they are in China; and to write down in words who they are and why they live in Beijing, why they chose the thing and location, and how they feel about being photographed. This project is more about me being in China than taking a photograph of someone else, as it helps me to further understand why I am still here.

I find that a lot of my work has to do with focusing on a particular project, not just random, as I know have begun to understand more of where I live here in China.
(“Beijing Station”, “China: People”, “Skipping: One-Two-One”).

Aside from doing conceptual and documentary style photography, I am also available to photograph people during rite-of-passage events such as Weddings and Baby’s First Birthday. But, if portraiture is something that you require, then that can also be arranged. Even though I have worked almost exclusively with adults, I actually find children “easier” to photograph due to their natural and uninhibited way.

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