THE CHAIN (SPECIAL EDT WITH METAL BOX) (ASSOCIATION COPY)

Chien-Chi Chang
THE CHAIN (SPECIAL EDT WITH METAL BOX) (ASSOCIATION COPY)

Photographs: Chien-Chi Chang

Text: Cheryl Lai

Publisher: Trolley Books

64 pages

Pictures: 47

Year: 2002

Comments: Illustrated hardcover housed in a metallic box, leporello, 19,5 x 13,4 cm. B&W photographs. Design by Martin Bell. In very good condition other some edge wears. The adhesive protection has not been removed from the bottom of the box. Nice association copy. Inscribed for a big Gallery name in 2010. RARE

Chien-Chi Chang captures life within the walls of Long Fa Tang sanitarium – the last resort for Taiwan's mentally ill, where they practice unconventional methods of treatment

Chien-Chi Chang’s work, The Chain, explores life within the walls of the Long Fa Tang Temple in southern Taiwan, which is both a sanctuary and a prison for 700 mental patients.

The temple administers neither medications nor treatments used in other such institutions. Instead, the Buddhist monks and nuns who oversee the patient population employ chains for “therapeutic” purposes.

A patient in a stable condition is linked and locked to one who is considered less sound. Day in and day out, the more lucid one leads the two-person chain gang.

Patients typically arrive at the temple under duress. After exhausting conventional medical treatments, desperate family members see Long Fa Tang as the last resort for the incurable. In the face of harsh criticism, temple authorities maintain that, as well as alleviating the tremendous burden on families, their methods have proven successful in treating the mentally ill.

Going through and having seen the photo story we were producing, Fruitmachine along with our publisher Gigi Giannuzzi of Trolley Books, had the great idea to design the book using a folding concertina, allowing us to join all the pages together. This was a literal remark to the conditions that the featured patients had to live and work. The cover is detachable with a pocket at either end that holds the first and last pages in place. The cover image is a spread that is split across the spine, where the chain linking the subjects continues from the front to the back cover.