Photographic Cold War, Free China, and Asia

In 1966 the Federation of Asian Photographic Arts was established in Taiwan. Lang Jingshan, the renowned Taiwanese photographer, invited Asian countries to organize their own photographic association after he had found himself the only photographer from Asia at the 1964 meeting of Fédération Internationale de l'Art Photographique (FIAP), which was an international photographic organization established in Switzerland in 1950. As can be seen in its naming, the Asian organization appropriated the European attempt to promote photographic arts. 60 representatives of 9 Asian countries gathered in the first congress, electing Lang Jingshan as the president. Unlike the European organization, which included members from the communist bloc, the Federation of Asian Photography Arts only included the Asian countries of the Free World, including South Korea, Japan, and South Vietnam.

This paper explores the ways in which photographers in Free China and overseas Chinese photographers in Southeast Asia played a crucial role in structuring Cold War politics through organizing and participating in international photography contests of the region during the post-WWII period. The paper aims to shed light on the practices of amateur photographers from the late 1950s to the 1970s, when they endeavored to establish photographic solidarity among the countries of what was called the Free World. The active participation of photographers from Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong in the Korean photography competitions will be discussed in order to foreground the hitherto less discussed transregional photographic scenes of the Cold War period.