OUT OF LIMITS－No One Sector－The Top View

The photography series No One Sector -- The Top View is a continuous art project that I have been doing in recent years. I have been taking photos for five or six years about the view at the top of thousands of buildings. Some of the photos were taken in vehicles or hotels when I was travelling around the world; and some were recordings when I was on the top of a mountain or a tall building and looked down or at other building tops. Because of different situations of my presence and recordings, these photos are with one other kind of visual experience, and at least it is not such photos taken in the sense of a professional photographer.

Paying attention to these top views is because the tops of these buildings undoubtedly are concentrated with thoughts of the designers and builders. Both functions and their Utopian imaginations, both geo-culture and ideology of time, society, and politics, are reflected from them. However, these top views attracted few people to look and to care. The urban process always put its edge to places further than where our vision can reach, and as time goes on, the top views seem become the edge of some memory, so the view of a city’s back makes us feel strange, and even a little bit wild and desolate. So I call these top views “No One Sector” or edge of a city. I wish these photos to remind people the edge of some memory, and make us recall the skyline and visual spectacle parallel to time and cross with the reality.

Guan Huaibin 

2013