red-white-blue bag — 红白蓝袋子

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.