details

2024
A4 landscape, 88 pages
Self-designed and published
£35
@yulin_liminal_research_unit

artist

Daniel Hesketh is photographically drawn to the obscure, unconventional and mundane, and his approach is the same anywhere geographically. Daniel’s subject matter consists of the everyday – dropped calling cards on the streets of Chengdu, questionable melon vans parked on the motorways in Puglia and electrical wholesalers in Leeds.

publication

This book – Daniel’s first – documents his time in Chengdu, China in Spring 2024. He wanted to focus on the older neighbourhoods around the city, especially the ones that are under threat of disappearing, or are in the process of disappearing altogether.

People in Chengdu are known for being laid-back, enjoying green tea and playing Mahjong. ‘I wanted to show this way of life known as “song chi gan”, which could be seen as random to some,’ Daniel explains.

He laid out the images so that they would visually relate to each other, such as durian fruit next to a mountain of rubble, creating diptychs within the pages. He explains: ‘When I made a start on my book, I began by making a folder of the potential photos I would be using. I then printed them out and laid them across my living room floor, and slowly whittled them down to around 80 photos’.

The book was bound using a traditional Chinese stab binding method and used a forest green cover to give a sense of the leafy city. Daniel adds: ’I find the process of producing a publication is very cathartic, and to have made something that exists in the real world is very rewarding.’