Reviews & Testimonials
A trove of lost photographs shows China on the cusp of change. This unique collection of black and white pictures, taken by Patrick in Beijing and Datong in 1986, formed an exhibition hosted by the Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents’ Club which was recently featured in the Financial Times “How To Spend It” magazine (October 17, 2020). The pictures also provide him with the context to share his thoughts on time, art history and Old Beijing through his extensive commentary.
FCC Correspondents’ Magazine
“We are all the luckier for seeing these pictures through the deeply empathetic lens that Patrick Dransfield brought to Beijing in 1986.”
Rana Mitter OBE FBA, Professor of the History & Politics of Modern China, Oxford University
I found the photographs presented on the Asia Society book launch video (20 January 2021) of ‘Track of Time: Moments of Transition’ surprisingly arresting. They were quite brilliantly augmented by Patrick Dransfield’s intriguing narration which was interwoven with art history/theory. I was particularly struck by Dransfield’s analysis of the Cubists (principally Braque and Picasso) and their contributions. The ‘Cubist Moment’ Dransfield refers to may also be viewed as having profound relevance for the processes of global politics and creative collaboration today - assuming we are entering a period of renewed convergence - and Congruence as he suggests.”.
Donald Lewis, Research Associate, China Business Studies Initiative (CBSI), University of San Francisco School of Management
Financial Times
“The camera, a 1960s Shanghai-manufactured Seagull, is a replica of the twin-lens periscope camera used by Chicago-based Vivian Maier, who evidently – like me – found satisfaction in simply pressing the shutter on that eternal moment expressed so poetically by the patron saint of street photographers, Mr Cartier-Bresson. Mine was bought with every spare yuan I had from a pawn shop on Wangfujing, Beijing’s Oxford Street.”
Testimonials
“Three years several emails and one pandemic later Patrick’s lost hoard of photographs has finally made it into the October 17 edition of the Financial Times’ How to Spend It magazine. ‘My Beijing Spring’ traces his observations as a young but enthusiastic amateur photographer, and offers a fascinating portrait of a way of life that has since immeasurably changed.”
Jo Ellison, Editor, How To Spend It.
FT Article - November 2022
Click here
SINOTALKS.COM interview with Patrick Dransfield - 1st February 2022
You can read the following versions of the interview via links below.
English version, click here.
Mandarin version, click here.
Old Lancastrian Club Newsletter 2021
To review the short essay in the 2021 Old Lancastrian (Lancaster Royal Grammar School's alumni) newsletter, click here
April 2021 presentation at the Vibe Book Shop
March 2021 interview by Expat Living
Lovers of photography – and particularly black-and-white photos that tell a story of a bygone time – will likely be enthralled by Track of Time: Moments of Transition, a new book by Patrick Dransfield.In January 2020, the long-term resident of Hong Kong stumbled upon hundreds of photos that he’d taken 34 years earlier on the streets of old Beijing and Datong in China. Now, 60 of the original images from that summer of 1986 have been published in a book, available through Bookazine. Read more
An audience with Patrick Dransfield at Art Roof Top, Hong Kong
Patrick was at the Art Roof Top Club last month for a portrait session. Apart from the photographs (below), you can view the video clips on Instagram via the following links.
https://www.instagram.com/tv/CKgkDzqgYLd/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
https://www.instagram.com/tv/CKgfeU-g1S_/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
“I found the photographs presented on the Asia Society book launch video (20 January 2021) of ‘Track of Time: Moments of Transition’ surprisingly arresting. They were quite brilliantly augmented by Patrick Dransfield’s intriguing narration which was interwoven with art history/theory. I was particularly struck by Dransfield’s analysis of the Cubists (principally Braque and Picasso) and their contributions. The ‘Cubist Moment’ Dransfield refers to may also be viewed as having profound relevance for the processes of global politics and creative collaboration today - assuming we are entering a period of renewed convergence - and Congruence as he suggests.”.
Donald Lewis, Research Associate, China Business Studies Initiative (CBSI), University of San Francisco School of Management
What's wrong with contemporary art: Jane Deeth at TEDxHobart
Click here to listen