‘700 psychiatric patients live chained together in pairs, and are forced to tend more than one million chickens at the largest chicken farm in Taiwan. Portraits of the players in this real yet surreal drama were photographed with kindness, respect and compassion by Magnum photographer Chien-Chi Chang.’

Lens Culture

From DLK: ‘Chien-Chi Chang makes portraits of pairs of mental patients at the Long Fa Tang Temple, where a stable patient is chained together with one with more severe problems in an unorthodox kind of bonding therapy.’

‘Chang appears to have neither permanent gallery representation in the US nor any meaningful secondary market history. My guess is the only option for interested collectors is to follow up directly via Magnum to inquire about potential prints for sale. That said, I think that either a mini-retrospective/survey show or a focused exhibit of portraits from The Chain should to be undertaken by some gallery in New York, as this work clearly merits being shown more broadly in the world of contemporary photography.’

Yes, it does.

Further reading: C-Arts here, and a book review of The Chain here.