red-white-blue bag — 红白蓝袋子

Art
Written By Bonnie Huang

The plastic woven red-white-blue bag (红白蓝袋子) has become symbolic of resilience and hardship due to its utilitarian durability and working-class associations in Southern China, Hong Kong, and in countries like Ghana and Nigeria. The ubiquitous significance of this patterned material is felt by migrants of displacement and diasporas across the world. 

On my recent trips to China, I began photographing how this fabric persists, across different cities– morphing into the city infrastructure, protecting belongings, or simply becoming the backdrop of a heaving scene. At times, it mutates into a behemoth that swallows what lies beneath it and other times it camouflages, barely noticeable, and recedes amongst scattered rubble. 

Photograph of two crates sitting on a backdrop of a red, white and blue striped fabric. A sliver of light illuminates a rectangle in the center.
Photograph of detritus on the ground, covered by a sheet of red, white and blue fabric, next to a road sign at night. The photo has vertical stripes of digital distortion.
Photograph of a shop front completely covered with a large red white and blue striped fabric at nighttime. The shop next to it is closed with a corrugated metal roller door.
Photograph of a discarded metal sink on a covering of red, white and blue striped fabric. Something bright is illuminating behind the fabric.
Photograph of hanging red white and blue striped fabric, draped and gathered together in the middle, creating wrinkles and folds. There are many baskets and buckets at the bottom.
Photo of a red, white and blue fabric used as a covering for a construction site, wrapped around a metal beam. Below, buckets of water and piles of cement.
Photo of an open air vegetable market, with red, white and blue striped fabric as roof and side coverings for the gazebo structure.
Bonnie Huang
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