Matsu - the 'Matsu Islands' as a keyword in contemporary Taiwanese society

Matsu - the Matsu Islands as one of the keywords of contemporary Taiwanese society: one of the looks presented through documentary photographic works on the people of Matsu and their daily lives.

Initiated in 2015, this series of photographs highlights the elderly people of Matsu, a small island off the coast of Taiwan. Close to China, Matsu became a military stronghold after the Nationalists retreated to Taiwan following their defeat by the Communists in the Chinese Civil War of 1949.

From 1956 to 1992, the island was under strict military control. Today's elderly inhabitants lived through this period marked by an authoritarian climate, including a ban on cameras, depriving an entire generation of the opportunity to build visual memories.

Through these photographs, Hsilun Chen sets out to revive the memory of a vanishing generation, giving them a voice through interviews and a face through authentic portraits. These images offer a poignant testimony to a little-known Taiwanese archipelago, far from Paris, and allow us to cross borders to plunge into the intimacy and sincerity of modest lives, those of people who until now had never had the opportunity to express themselves.