[TALK] Shanghai – City in Motion: The Rebirth of a Modern Metropolis
Join us for a talk by Nicky Almasy, showcasing an intimate portrait of Shanghai through its built environment over the past century. This event is hosted by Penang Institute and co-hosted by Gerakbudaya Bookshop.
Details
Speaker: Nicky Almasy
Moderator: Gareth Richards
Date: Monday, 21st October 2024
Time: 8.00-9.30pm
Venue: Conference Hall, Penang Institute
Note: Entrance to this event is FREE. Join us in person or watch the live stream on Penang Institute’s Facebook and YouTube channel.
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ABSTRACT
As a photographer Nicky Almasy documented Shanghai for over a decade in the vortex of one of the greatest urban transformations in history – a city deconstructing and reconstructing before his eyes. He shot Shanghai’s extraordinary changes through its architecture, capturing the interweaving of international styles and designs that are the signature of the urban landscape and manifested in its fascinating design elements.
The talk focuses on Shanghai’s Art Deco heritage, with its combination of Modernist skylines and disappearing neighbourhoods. In particular, Nicky Almasy looks at the city through the work of the great Hungarian-Slovak architect László Hudec and his architectural legacy. Between 1918 and 1947 Hudec designed and built more than a hundred buildings in Shanghai – hotels, hospitals, churches and government buildings, including some of the most important structures, of which 31 have been recognised as Shanghai heritage architecture sites. Hudec’s work remains a hallmark of the city to the present and his name has become at one with Shanghai. Nicky Almasy documented the architect’s existing buildings in his book Hudec (2017). While completing the book, he discovered a second, relatively unknown Hungarian architect Károly Gonda, who was also active in Shanghai, and that led to another publication, Gonda (2019).
The talk also looks at the contemporary side of Shanghai’s transformation as Nicky Almasy documented the construction of Shanghai Tower, completed in 2014 and then the world’s second tallest building. In doing so, he working closely with the building’s chief architect, Marshall Strabala.
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SPEAKER
Award-winning photographer and filmmaker Nicky Almasy has been living and working in Asia since 2005, concentrating on architecture, culture, art and heritage. In Shanghai he was commissioned to shoot the second tallest building of the world, the Shanghai Tower, and was the construction photographer on the project for five consecutive years. His first book, Hudec, on architect Laszlo Hudec, was published in 2017 and was followed by a biography of another Hungarian architect, Karoly Gonda, published in 2019. His work on architecture won two photography awards, one for ENR and in 2012 and 2016 for Arcaid. He has also worked with various international publications such as WHERE, The Financial Times and the Daily Mail, and his photos have been featured on the covers of over fifty magazines. Nicky was also AirAsia’s official photojournalist for the Travel360 inflight magazine for 5 consecutive years.
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MODERATOR
Gareth Richards is a researcher, writer, editor, bookseller, and activist in the arts scene. He founded Impress Creative & Editorial in 2008 and co-founded Gerakbudaya Bookshop, advocating for community engagement through pop-up book stalls. In 2018, he established Hikayat, an arts space focused on literature. His interests include critical social sciences and literary fiction, with favorite authors like Pramoedya Ananta Toer and Toni Morrison.
Gareth co-edited Asia–Europe Interregionalism: Critical Perspectives (1999) and Discourses, Agency and Identity in Malaysia (2022), and authored texts for Portraits of Penang: Little India (2011) and Panicrama (2016). He has also served on juries for the Penang Book Prize and the Epigram Books Fiction Prize.
Event Summary
Penang Institute organized jointly with Gerak Budaya last night (21 October 2024) a talk by award-winning photographer and documentary film-maker Nicky Almasy, entitled ‘Shanghai – City in Motion: The Rebirth of a Modern Metropolis’, in which Almasy showcased his intimate relationship and knowledge of the past and present of one of the world’s main centers for finance, manufacturing, transportation, and other economic activities and processes, tourism and culture, and for research, science and technology.
In his talk moderated by Gerak Budaya co-founder and director Gareth Richards, Almasy presented not only his photographic documentation – “in real time” over the period 2010-2015 – of the construction of the 632-meter Shanghai Tower, Asia’s tallest building and the world’s second after the Burj Khalifa in the United Arab Emirates, and its environs, but also kept the audience at rapt attention through his visual and audio narrative of Shanghai’s development through the historical biographies of two Hungarian architects – Laszlo Hudec (1893-1958) and Karoly Gonda (1889–1969) – who played critical roles in shaping the city’s distinct architectural heritage and current landscape. Almasy ended his talk by presenting a six-minute clip of his hauntingly beautiful documentary film on the construction of the Shanghai Tower and its main architect, Marshall Strabala. On sale were three of Almasy’s books Hudec , Gonda – Shanghai’s Ultramodern Hungarian Architect , and City in Motion: Rebirth of a Modern Metropolis .
Event Highlights