Contemporary by Angela Li is proud to present “The Great Three Gorges”, a solo exhibition of latest works by internationally acclaimed Chinese photographer Chen Jiagang.

Chen, an artist as complex as his works, is a former architect and businessman. In this much anticipated show, following on from his retrospective at the Hong Kong International Art Fair earlier this year, he brings us an exciting new collection of works. Debuting some dramatic new techniques and portraying powerful panoramic effects, combined with his discerning eye for detail, Chen offers us his new “Great Three Gorges” series.

The Three Gorges Dam is not only a monumental engineering achievement; it has bought us some undeniable world records. It is the biggest dam, power plant and largest consumer of dirt, stone, concrete and steel. But also, on top of that, this project is responsible for the displacement of in excess of 1.13 million people, suggested as one of the largest human resettlements in modern times.

Along with its spawning environmental problems like water pollution and landslides, this rising controversy makes it easy to over look that it is, in fact, the world’s biggest manmade producer of electricity from renewable energy. Hydropower is the centerpiece of one of China’s most praised green initiatives along with a plan to rapidly expand renewable energy by 2020. In this, his current series of works, Chen tries to capture some of these landscapes, unearthed by the relocation, some which are desolate and others that are now highly urban as a result.