Southwest Cinematography: The Scientific, Ethnic and Aesthetic Nature of Sun Mingjing’s Frontier Photographic Perspective

Abstract

Sun Mingjing is the pioneer of modern Chinese film education and the pioneer of Chinese TV industry. From 1938 to 1945, Sun Mingjing moved westward to Sichuan due to the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, and the southwest countries naturally became the theme of his photography. At that time, there were many provinces such as Sichuan, Kang, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Tibet in the southwest. However, the academic circles at that time paid little attention to and researched on this area due to the remote location, the difficult roads, and the distribution of many ethnic minorities. Photography is not only an image recording medium, but also an important image-building tool. A history of photography is also a history of visual viewing and image changes. The author tries to sort out Sun Mingjing’s Southwest photographic works, compare his photographic works with other works of similar themes in the same period, and study Sun Mingjing’s photography investigation of landscape, geography, ethnic minorities and people’s livelihood, in which way a glimpse of the social phenomenon in ethnic minority areas in modern Southwest China can be viewed from those real images, and we can explore the scientific, national and aesthetic approach to appreciate his works.